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POSTED: Sunday, Jun. 15, 2008

Pedestrian bridge sought at Blaine's Pacific Highway

5-lane road is heavily traveled; man hit by car died in April

BLAINE — To cross busy Pacific Highway just south of H Street, pedestrians must navigate five lanes, often filled with heavy semi trucks bound for the border.

In early March, one 63-year-old man didn’t make it. Walking against a “Don’t Walk” sign, Timothy L. Mosby of Red Bluff, Calif., was hit by a car. He was taken to St. Joseph Hospital, where he died April 23, more than seven weeks later, of head trauma. Blaine Police Chief Mike Haslip said the driver of the vehicle will not face charges.

City leaders, seeing the prospect of more pedestrian-vehicle conflicts, are calling for construction of a pedestrian bridge. Up to 2,000 trucks use the highway each day, cutting between public school properties with about 2,100 students and a commercial mall just east of there.

“The council feels that the state really needs to put a pedestrian overpass there,” City Manager Gary Tomsic said. “There needs to be a way to separate the pedestrian traffic from the truck traffic.”

The City Council on Monday unanimously approved its sixyear transportation improvement program, an annually updated list of street projects the city wants to complete during the next six years. For the first time, the list includes a pedestrian bridge at Pacific Highway and H Street, although the project isn’t likely to happen for years.

In the future, the city expects more trucks to use the highway, and more pedestrians to cross it.

The proposed Grandis Pond project would add 1,030 homes, and the East Maple Ridge development would add 350 homes east of Pacific Highway near H Street. The city also plans to sell the airport, allowing developers to build commercial and industrial developments there. Nearby developments could be required to help pay for a pedestrian bridge, Public Works Director Steve Banham said.

Meanwhile, more drivers likely will use the Pacific Highway crossing, especially after the federal government’s project to rebuild its Peace Arch border station disrupts cross-border travel, he said.

The city put the bridge on the six-year plan to get it on the “radar screen,” Banham said, but it probably won’t happen for years, and not likely before the Vancouver, B.C., 2010 Winter Olympics.

The city’s transportation plan roughly estimates the bridge would cost more than $1 million. Tomsic said the City Council considers the project the state’s responsibility.

But the state Department of Transportation, which rebuilt Pacific Highway leading up to the border, says money simply isn’t available. As part of that project, the DOT built an overpass at D Street, making it easier for locals to cross the highway.

“Our hands are in our pockets and we’re pulling out lint,” said Todd Carlson, DOT planning and operations manager. “That acute local problem, I would agree that we should be a partner. It’s just that we don’t have the money.”

The DOT recently released potential safety fixes for Interstate 5 through Bellingham, and those new overpasses, ramps and separated merging lanes could cost well over $1 billion, Carlson said.

The state constitution prevents the DOT from spending gas tax money on a pedestrian overpass, he said, so the DOT would rely on federal funding, just like the city may have to, he said.

Still, the DOT sees the need for a pedestrian bridge there, he said, and the DOT would support the city in applying for federal money.

“It makes sense,” he said. “There’s a lot of trucks there and it’s not always the most comfortable walking around trucks.”