No major changes for site of school bus crash

County won’t seek funding for traffic circle or lights but will post advisory speed limit at rural Fredonia intersection
By 
DAN BENSOIN
Ozaukee Press staff

Deciding they’ve done just about all they can do to improve a Town of Fredonia intersection that was the site of a bus crash in September, a committee of Ozaukee County supervisors opted last week to not seek state funds to improve the corner and instead directed Highway Department staff to make two more minor improvements.

“I think the most significant things to be done have already been done,” Marty Wolf, chairman of the county Public Works Committee, said at the committee’s meeting last week.

In September, eight students on their way to classes were injured and taken to hospitals after an SUV blew a stop sign on Jay Road, which is a Town of Fredonia road, and hit the school bus traveling on Highway E, a county road.

The force of the crash spun the bus 180 degrees and caused it to roll over and come to a stop on its side in a ditch.

An unknown number of additional students were taken to clinics and emergency rooms by their parents after they picked them up at the scene of the crash.

Parents of the children had asked the county and town for improvements at the intersection, including constructing a traffic circle or installing traffic lights.

Some improvements have already been made to improve visibility and awareness at the intersection.

Those have included installing lights on stop signs for eastbound and westbound traffic on Jay Road, flags on top of “stop ahead” signs in advance of the stop signs on Jay Road,  adding reflective striping on the warning signs, and trimming tree branches on the southeast corner to improve visibility.

Last week, the committee directed Highway Commissioner Jon Edgren to add flashing lights to the “intersection ahead” warning sign on Jay Road and to post an advisory speed limit of 45 mph there as well.

Edgren told the committee that installing stop lights or a traffic circle at the intersection would be so expensive a state grant would be necessary. But the accident history there does not justify the expense in the state’s eyes.

“Given the lack of accident history, I doubt that (the state Department of Transportation) will fund any significant intersection reconstruction,” Edgren said in a memo to the committee.

He estimated that building a traffic circle would likely cost about $2 million, while state grants typically are limited to $1 million.

There have been five accidents at the intersection since 2017, none of them fatal, Edgren said.

Some parents have argued, however, that there have been more accidents, as many as 21, based on the number of police calls to the intersection.

` In recent years, the state did pay for a traffic circle at Highway 32 and County Highway I, but only after there had been several fatal accidents there.

Edgren also conducted a speed study at the intersection, which showed that 85% of the cars approaching the intersection are traveling slower than the 55 mph speed limit and that advanced warning signs are already in place where the line of sight is deemed insufficient.

His study also found that traffic volumes are higher on Jay Road than on Highway E.

Currently, stop signs are on Jay Road.

“Typically, stop signs would be placed on the lower volume roadway, but I would have significant concerns placing a stop sign on northbound county Highway E,  given the poor sight distance and downhill grade,” he said.

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Wisconsin’s largest paid circulation community weekly newspaper. Serving Port Washington, Saukville, Grafton, Fredonia, Belgium, as well as Ozaukee County government. Locally owned and printed in Port Washington, Wisconsin.

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