October 2011
Lake Travis
Economic Impact Report

Community Impact Southwest Austin

Officials: Redesign coming to Y at Oak Hill Share |
By Joseph Olivieri
Thursday, 03 March 2011

AUSTIN — Transportation officials plan to improve traffic at the Y at Oak Hill by 2012 by redesigning how left turns are made.

The adjustment would cut morning and evening eastbound delays by roughly half, officials say, and have similar effects on evening westbound traffic delays.

The redesign is one of several adjustments intended to bring temporary relief to the Hwy. 290 corridor between Joe Tanner Lane and FM 1826—a part of the 2010 Mobility Bond Program.

City and state officials praised the changes, and the intergovernmental collaboration that funded it, at the announcement at Austin City Hall March 3.

"The Y at Oak Hill is one of the biggest and most infamous traffic intersections in Central Texas," State Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, said. "Making improvements is difficult even in good financial times."

He said more than 49,000 people travel through Oak Hill each day and added that, while a permanent fix is years away, it's important to make interim improvements to improve quality of life.

Austin Mayor Lee Leffingwell, Travis County Commissioner Karen Huber and Ray Wilkerson, Chairman of the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, touted the collaboration that will implement the plans.

At the Y, the Texas Department of Transportation would create a continuous flow intersection.

"Traditionally, left-turning and through traffic have to wait for each other at the signal," according to a TxDOT statement. "[A continuous flow intersection] uses new upstream traffic signals and new lanes to shift left-turning traffic and through traffic to the right of each other."

"At the main intersection, opposing left turns and through traffic can then safely flow at the same time."

TxDOT would also improve other intersections along the corridor, HDR Consultant Rashed Islam said.

Those changes include adding dual turning lanes at FM 1826 and at Convict Hill Road, maximizing signal times at the entrance to Austin Community College, and installing median U-turns.

The City of Austin will pay for $4 million of the $5.58 million cost. Travis County will contribute $1.5 million and the remaining $87,000 will come from a collaboration between TxDOT, the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority and Capital Metro.

The next step in the project is for TxDOT to begin preliminary work and environmental studies, Islam said.

Following the meeting, Sandy Baldridge, president of the Oak Hill Association of Neighborhoods, said the changes "would have to help" with traffic times, run-off and air pollution. "It's improving a 1958 design that hasn't been touched in 30 years," she said.

Link to the original online article

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