Roundabout plan worries some

One Bennington resident worries about losing part of her property. A second wonders how safely children could walk to school. A third is concerned about how the city spends tax dollars.

More than 150 Bennington residents — including some who want a public hearing where they could speak — listened to an update Wednesday night about a proposal to improve the city's main north-south roadway.

The proposal for the 156th Street project includes making part of the two-lane road into three lanes, resurfacing the street, adding some sidewalks and a bike path, improving drainage, building traffic-calming curves in the road and constructing a roundabout at the intersection of 156th Street and Bennington Road.

Most who attended the informational meeting favored resurfacing the roadway south of Nebraska Highway 36. The proposed roundabout, though, left many residents concerned.

Designers with Kirkham Michael, the project's design firm, stressed that nothing is final on the project, which awaits a federal environmental review.

But the roundabout, if built, would cut so close to Kaye Bridgeford's property, she joked, that she would be able to “sell burgers out her bedroom window.”

Bridgeford has lived in a white house on the northeast corner of the Bennington Road intersection for 17 years. She questioned whether a town of about 1,500 people needs a circular route to slow but not stop traffic.

Bridgeford could not recall a major accident or other trouble at the intersection, she said.

Today, the four-way intersection has a blinking red light to stop traffic. Because too few people drive the route, it wouldn't qualify for federal money to install a full-blown traffic light.

Project manager Murthy Koti said the proposed changes should curb speeding along a stretch of road several blocks long, improve the roadway for future use and help traffic flows in and out of the nearby Bennington Elementary School.

But Di Loptin and many other residents questioned how safe schoolchildren would be crossing the street. Kids cross now where the roundabout would be.

Each school day, Loptin drives her sixth-grade daughter to the school, just west of the intersection.

“We'll get kids out there confused about where to go and when to cross the street,” she said. “It just doesn't seem safe.”

Koti said that roundabouts are safer than most people think and that he understands the apprehension many people have toward changing a stretch of roadway that serves as the city's main entrance. For one thing, he said, drivers must slow down to about 15 miles per hour when driving through the roundabout.

James Miller, an urban engineer at the Nebraska Department of Roads, said that while roundabouts are safer for vehicles, they “are not necessarily pedestrian-friendly.”

The project is expected to cost about $4 million. Of that, Bennington would pay 20 percent, or about $800,000.

Those figures didn't sit well with Bill Dunn, who has lived in town for more than 40 years. On Wednesday, he said, he heard nothing he liked.

“It's a terrible waste of federal money,” Dunn said.

Contact the writer:

444-3198, chip.olsen@owh.com