U.S. 2 safety group applies for grant

U.S. 2 in Snohomish County is so crowded and unsafe that there have been 1,500 collisions and 34 fatalities in the past decade.

Community leaders along the busy two-lane highway estimate it will take millions of dollars to make the road safe for motorists, but for now they just want money to figure out what needs to be done to prevent serious accidents.

To that end, the grass-roots Highway 2 Safety Coalition last week applied for a $3 million federal grant to study widening or rerouting parts of the highway.

If approved, the money would be used to identify the "hot spots" on the highway that need immediate work, said Lorena Eng, a regional director of the state Department of Transportation.

Building a bypass around Monroe would likely top the list, Eng said. U.S. 2 currently splits one of the city’s largest retail districts.

Average daily traffic on the highway went up by about 9 percent between 1993 and 2002, according to Transportation Department statistics.

The coalition formed in 1998 following several fatal accidents on U.S. 2. It aims to improve the highway either by expanding it into a four-lane road or by routing it around cities in the Sky Valley, said Sultan Police Chief Fred Walser, who is also the coalition’s chief.

It would cost $8 million to properly study what it would take to expand capacity on U.S. 2 from Snohomish to Stevens Pass, but a failed bid to get that amount in the past has the coalition thinking smaller this time around, Walser said.

"We didn’t understand the complete system last year," he said.

The $3 million application is more realistic, Eng said, because most federal grants recently approved for road projects were less than $3 million.

But the coalition may not get the full amount due to high competition for such grants.

"You need to be flexible," Eng said, adding that the state has no money yet earmarked for the U.S. 2 project.

Walser said a decision on the grant application is expected in May or June.

"Once we can get this approved, we can get going," he said.

Reporter Yoshiaki Nohara: 425-339-3029 or ynohara@heraldnet.com.