Tom Hughs of Arlington writes: Wade Road runs east from 67th Avenue NE, up the hill, and ends about 200 yards shy of Highway 9. What is preventing Wade Road from intersecting with Highway 9?
Owen Carter, chief engineer for Snohomish County, responds: This is an excellent question. Snohomish County Public Works is preparing an update for long-term road needs as part of an update to the county’s comprehensive plan, expected to be adopted in 2012.
The Public Works Department has begun collecting data on the need for another east-west corridor connecting Highway 9 and 67th Avenue NE.
I will have staff perform a preliminary investigation on the possibility of making this connection with Wade Road.
Wheelchair crossings
Last week, StreetSmarts featured a change in the state law that will require drivers to stop for wheelchair riders who are anywhere in a crosswalk, from beginning to end. The law takes effect in August.
I stand corrected on one point.
My impression after reading the current law, and talking to people involved in the change, was that state law does not require a driver turning right or left in an intersection to yield to a pedestrian or a person in a wheelchair unless that person is on the side of the roadway in which the vehicle is headed.
As a couple of readers reminded me, however, the text of the law (RCW 46.61.235) reads that drivers are required to stop when the pedestrian is “within one lane of the half of the roadway upon which the vehicle is traveling or onto which it is turning.”
Fair enough. The confusing part, however, is the next sentence: “For purposes of this section ‘half of the roadway’ means all traffic lanes carrying traffic in one direction of travel, and includes the entire width of a one-lane roadway.”
Would it not include a two-lane, two-way roadway as well? If so, why does the law mention one lane and not two? To me at first glance, the fact that the law specified a one-lane road meant that it does not apply to the two-lane road.
Perhaps whoever wrote the law took historical lessons in ambiguity from the writer of the Second Amendment to the Constitution.
Either way, the point of the story was that drivers need to pay more attention and give a wide berth to people in wheelchairs, and pedestrians and bicyclists as well.
I’ll keep looking into it.
E-mail Street Smarts at stsmarts@heraldnet.com. Please include your city of residence.
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