By Joe Bachman
Editor

STEVENS POINT — Bicycle and Pedestrian Street Safety Commission members discussed the various options before taking final bids on a Stanley Street re-striping project.

Officials discussed whether or not to add a four-way stop at Stanley Street and Minnesota Avenue in addition to the re-striping. This includes appropriate transitions at the east end of the lane conversion.

According to Public Works director Scott Beduhn, he recommends that the city put a hold on the all-way stop signs, and focus on the road diet before additional signage.

“I’d rather implement what we have under existing speed limits,” said Scott Beduhn, who stated that he would rather study the corridor after the re-striping to measure whether or not a four-way stop should be put into place.  “…my opinion is that you implement the paint, and see how it works.”

District 1 Alder Tori Jennings met with public works officials, as well as a state expert from the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, to discuss the four-way stop. According to Jennings, this state expert recommended simply going with the re-striping on its own.

“Remember, these are just signs stuck in the road — and the two options are either to start with the four-way stop, and see how it works; and remove the signs if it doesn’t work — or go with the striping and evaluate how that’s working, and if it’s not working, put in the four-way stop,” said Jennings. “It’s just signs — let’s not over-complicate this.”

In addition, an ordinance must be passed for stop signs to be installed on Stanley Street, as there currently does not exist one, according to Beduhn.

No action was ultimately taken, as officials will wait until all project bids are submitted by Tuesday, Aug, 7 for further action.