Intersection will be realigned
By Terry Murry on Monday, July 17th, 2023 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
HERMISTON – The Hermiston City Council has approved realigning the intersection of East Fourth Street and Main to include a left-turn lane. The realignment will mean the loss of seven parking spaces, but Assistant City Manager Mark Morgan says there’s a proposal to add more spaces on the north side of Gladys Avenue.
“There’s an ample amount of significantly under-utilized on-street parallel parking, so we’ll go in and stripe that for angled parking,” he said.
Morgan added that then the city would see a net gain of five parking spaces in the area. He added that the city has known the intersection to be a challenge for several years.
“The intention is not to make it easier to turn left out of Fourth Street,” he said. “The intention is to get those people who are turning left out of the way.”
The decision became more urgent when the traffic control equipment embedded in the road failed. The city switched the traffic control devices to a timed cycle for the time being, but will be installing a new system that reacts to traffic numbers during the realignment project.
