The public meeting with KDOT representatives on Feb. 25 clarified the dilemma: Because the present misalignment of east-west turn lanes makes 31st and Iowa streets a dangerous intersection, KDOT has offered the city $300,000 to help realign them.

Without the work on 31st Street needed for the development, Lawrence’s share of this project would run about $50,000. With the additional expenses for necessary work on 31st Street to accommodate the development, the estimated cost to the city is $1.6 million, and rising.

We now learn that improvements to this intersection would be finished about 2003, and within three more years it is predicted to fall back to a “D” grade! Total failure of the intersection could come as early as 2010.

What would Lawrence citizens get for our $1.6 million? Two additional stoplights on 31st that are too close together to allow for manageable traffic flow, enough concrete to transform Ousdahl Street into a “main trafficway” and a lawsuit filed by the owners of the commercial area at the southeast corner of the intersection, whose access would be cut off to accommodate Home Depot.

The problems in south Lawrence require the willingness to plan and zone appropriately, and the resolve to stand by planning decisions. The city commission is within its right to reconsider the appropriateness of allowing this development to proceed at all.

The developers themselves cleverly anticipated this outcome when they bought the rights to build at Sixth Street and Wakarusa Drive. The city has already committed to improving Wakarusa Drive whether or not a “big box” store is built there. At that location, estimated costs for the city are $673,000 Â most of which will be spent on streets which benefit the public, rather than the developer. According to KDOT, that intersection is better suited to handle traffic volumes generated by these kinds of stores.

Jeanne Ellermeier,

Lawrence