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Press Release
Westheimer congestion targeted: New study seeks to resolve traffic issues on major artery From a traffic standpoint, every day looks like the Christmas shopping season on Westheimer. The congestion on this major east-west artery, and how to lessen it, will be the subject of a study that begins with a public meeting today. Local transportation officials will hear complaints and note suggestions regarding the 11-mile Westheimer corridor, which runs between the West Loop and Texas 6, from 3 to 7 p.m. at Tracy Gee Community Center, 3599 Westcenter Drive. Alan Clark, chief transportation planner for the Houston-Galveston Area Council, said the meeting is mainly intended to gather such comments as, "Boy! Why can't somebody fix this?" Clark said the open-house format will include brief presentations and time for one-to-one conversations with transportation officials, who will present possible solutions in meetings early next year. Sponsors of the $250,000 study include H-GAC and the Texas Department of Transportation - the crowded retail artery is also a state road, FM 1093. Each will contribute $100,000. Two business groups, the Uptown Houston District and the Westchase District, are contributing $25,000 each and "kind of jump-started" the study, Clark said. The study area was limited to outside the West Loop, Clark said, because the traffic volume and growth are greater there and because of the business support. Clark said a later study may look at Westheimer inside the West Loop, and some things learned in the current one may apply there as well. Clark said the sponsors expect to hear about traffic lights that don't work, turn lanes that are too short, long walks to bus stops, lack of sidewalks "and just too much traffic." Although little can be done to widen Westheimer, already four lanes in each direction for most of the distance, several improvements could be made, Clark said. Among the suggestions: Using computers and pavement sensors to coordinate traffic signals, lengthening left-turn lanes, and building an underpass at the West Belt frontage roads so Westheimer traffic would not have to stop for the light. Clark said property owners along Westheimer could help by linking their parking lots and reducing the number of exits onto the street. They could also make the lengthy strip shopping centers along much of the route more pedestrian-friendly, he said. "There are a lot of people who live very close (to Westheimer)," Clark said, "but you can be living two blocks away and still have a hard time getting there on foot. If there's a strip commercial area, there's often no way to walk through the middle of it. You have to walk all the way around." Clark said that completion of the Westpark Tollway and the widening of the Katy Freeway will provide some relief for east-west traffic in west Houston by mid-decade. But traffic is growing so fast on Westheimer that even with the tollway and added Katy lanes, congestion in the corridor will be a problem, he said. Although the study will focus on Westheimer, officials say traffic from side streets is part of the problem. Clark said officials want to know whether bottlenecks on Westheimer are driving motorists to take alternate routes or vice versa. "I would hope the study does more than deal with moving people up and down Westheimer," said Uptown Houston president John Breeding. "You have to look all the way from Westpark to San Felipe and see how it all affects moving people." As one approaches the Loop, much of that traffic is going to or from the Galleria, the largest shopping magnet on the study route. "With success comes traffic," said Julie Cuenod, senior marketing manager for Chicago-based Urban Retail Properties Co., owner of the Galleria. Although Cuenod said she knows of no specific requests from the Galleria owner for Westheimer itself, she said managers of the complex have been "working with Uptown Houston on an overall plan for the area, and there are many aspects of it we are pleased with." Among these, she said, are plans by the Transportation Department to build separate sets of ramps connecting the West Loop to Westheimer and San Felipe, in place of ramps carrying traffic to and from both major cross streets. Cuenod also praised plans to create an exit ramp from the West Loop to Hidalgo Street near the Williams Tower water wall, and an entrance to the West Loop from West Alabama. |
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