The intersection of Norristown Road and Limekiln Pike. (Credit: Google Street View)
The improvement of intersections along Norristown Road was a topic of much discussion during last week’s Upper Dublin Township Board of Supervisors meeting
A new, 72-unit development along a tract of land dubbed “The Goodman Tract,” nestled between Welsh Road and Norristown Road, at Limekiln Pike, was a topic of discussion during the Upper Dublin Township Board of Supervisors’ May 14 meeting.
Kurt M. Ferguson, Township Manager, said that after hearing concerns of many residents, there has been a proposed “swap” of funds to ultimately get more projects done for the township’s traffic troubles.
Jack Smythe, Upper Dublin Township Traffic Engineer, was asked to weigh in on options for the roadways and find out what could be done to both make the new development work, and increase the safety of the area’s intersections.
“Jack met with residents; he and I had met and looked for opportunities, ways that could better address these concerns sooner rather than later,” said Ferguson. “Part of this presentation tonight has been the hard work of our traffic engineer to figure out how we could have multiple agencies on a very expedited time frame, come to an agreement that would allow us to move forward on both intersections within the same project deadline.”
Ferguson said the teamwork and collaboration of all necessary parties was something to commend.
“Jack’s done just a remarkable job in pulling these details together. This is about as good as it gets in terms of multi-agency cooperation,” said Ferguson.
Firstly, Smythe described that the developers of the Goodman Tract had to agree to improvements on the area’s roadways as a stipulation of their project’s approval at Norristown Road and Limekiln Pike. These intersection improvements included a need to “add turn lanes and then upgrade all of the signal equipment at the intersection.”
Overall, Smythe outlined and included images describing the magnitude of projects that developers at the Goodman Tract would have had to do, including:
In addition to transportation roadways, the developer would also need to improve walking paths in and around the development.
“There is an eight-foot-wide asphalt trail shown in red that extends from Limekiln and Norristown, up Limekiln to Welsh, and then up Welsh to the west and crosses over Butler PIke,” said Smythe. “Lastly there is a sidewalk that is shown in blue along the Norristown Road frontage.”
These improvements were projected to be a part of the developer’s responsibilities in adding a 72-unit build to the site. But as plans continued to unfold, Upper Dublin Township’s board found out that they weren’t the only ones hoping to improve road safety in that area.
“All of that was worked out in the land development phase,” said Smythe. “As the developer was getting into the permitting with PennDOT to advance especially the Norristown and Limekiln Pike intersection, and Welsh and Limekiln, we became aware that there is a PennDOT project that will be addressing the totality of the Maple Glen Triangle. It had been a project that PennDOT had to put on the shelf due to funding, but then came back about a year ago.”
This discovery first resulted in the need for a fine-tuning of communications.
“We approached PennDOT to say, ‘how do we make sure that the left hand is talking to the right hand’ in regards to the projects, and as that started, we also started thinking about Norristown and Butler,” said Smythe.
These discussions with the state, coupled with area residents’ concern about safety in the area, got Smythe thinking of a new solution: What if the funds could be “swapped” for a different use?
“The residents had rightly brought up that there are existing needs at Norristown and Butler Pike, so the question that we posed to PennDOT was, ‘is there an ability to repurpose the funds from what the Goodman Tract is doing at Norristown and Limekiln, and Welsh and Limekiln, and actually apply it to Norristown and Butler,’” Smythe said. “Their response was twofold: 1. The dollars need to line up and 2. The timing needs to line up.”
After many deliberations with the state’s planners, Smythe said it was determined that the timing would not be an issue. The Goodman Tract should be wrapping on their developments in 2025, and PennDOT hopes to begin its changes just after, in late 2025, early 2026. Thankfully, too, the “dollars” lined up after Smythe created a detailed project slated to improve the Norristown Road at Butler Pike intersection.
As it presently stands, the area consists of one lane in each direction and has queues, or long lines of congestion, that “extend quite extensively on Norristown, but also on Butler Pike. There are safety concerns.”
A crash summary from PennDOT showed that accidents from 2016 to 2019 amassed an average of four to five crashes per year at this intersection alone.
“We established the pattern that there are safety concerns at Norristown and Butler,” Smythe said of the report. “When you look to the drivers’ actions, it is improper/careless turns and running red lights [causing accidents]. People are getting frustrated and are doing things they wouldn’t normally do if they had the ability to make it through the intersection.”
That led the township’s traffic engineer to look into traffic simulation software to build a model to show the network of roads, building in all traffic signals and timings. He was then able to simulate peak traffic times with existing conditions and then include improvement proposals to decrease delay. This way, the team could virtually test theories for improvement to see the results prior to making changes in the real-world scenarios.
Currently, the roads and signals in this area scored an “E.”
“And, just like in school, A through F — E is not good,” said Smythe. “That’s an average delay of around one minute. And that’s an average delay for every person approaching the intersection from any direction, so some are more, and some are a little less. But in general, there are also operational issues.”
Taking both safety and operational issues into consideration, Smythe said they looked at a number of possible changes to improve the intersections.
“Along Norristown, we are proposing left-turn lanes with widening that is shown in green. Everything is within the legal right-of-way, and what this does is addresses a lot of safety concerns and a lot of operational concerns,” said Smythe. “Those improper/careless turns? Now someone is in a left-turn lane. They’re in a protected lane where they can wait to make the turn and thru cars behind them can keep going, and they’re not waiting to get around them.”
The changes also included a channelized right turn if you’re heading down Norristown toward the Maple Glen Triangle. Construction pricing included the channelized island that “would better allow for the right turn.”
“Truck-running templates were also applied to the proposed intersections, to be sure that large trucks could make the new turn,” explained Smythe. “All new signal equipment would also be installed to accommodate the changes.”
The massive project at Norristown and Butler would be covered by the total projected to be needed for the developer to cover responsibilities for roadway improvements.
“There’s new signal equipment, there’s left-turn lanes, there’s widening; the last thing is there is a residential driveway that comes right into the middle of the intersection that is shown in red,” said Smythe. “We would be proposing to relocate that driveway along the side of the property to come out so that it is outside of the intersection limits. Where it is right now, the driveway is not controlled by a traffic signal, so it’s a look-around-to-see-when-you-can-go type of situation.”
The movement of the driveway would allow for it to not be “counted” in turns for new signals, and instead would relocate it to be removed from the intersection equation.
“If it were to stay, the driveway would be required to be incorporated into the signals,” said Smythe. “Instead, the township is proposing a move which was incorporated into construction costs, as well.”
Simulated models of the proposed changes showed that both morning and afternoon peak queues were improved in all cases.
“All of those queues come down substantially as a result,” said Smythe. “Everything shrinks as a result.”
By allowing for funds to shift from the Goodman Tract to the intersection at Norristown and Butler, the township will be able to have the “best of both worlds.” The changes at Welsh/Norristown/Limekiln will be handled by PennDOT, while the township will handle (thanks to repurposed funding by the developer) the changes at Norristown and Butler.
“What we are recommending is to move forward to repurpose funds that the developer would have been spending at Norristown and Limekiln, as well as Welsh and Limekiln, to design and construct the improvements we are showing at Norristown and Butler,” said Smythe.
After meeting with both PennDOT, and Montgomery County — as Butler Pike is a county road — Smythe said that the township’s representatives made clear what the project “is and is not” to all parties involved.
For example, Ferguson said that a large concern of the state is the requirement for underground drainage, which thanks to careful testing and planning, this change will not necessitate. The county, who operates Butler Pike, also wanted bike lanes in the future, but the township made it clear this would not include that at this time.
“When we go in, when recommendation goes through, we [wanted to ensure] are not blindsided by a red flag once everything has already been revised,” said Smythe. “Upon acceptance of that by PennDOT and County, we are recommending to repurpose the funds.”
Ferguson said that he wanted to make it clear, other responsibilities of the developer, such as on-site changes and walkways, are still up to that developer to handle.
“The other obligations for the developer were site improvements for what he intends to do on his property to widen that one portion of the road, immediately adjacent. All of those requirements are still there,” he said. “It is just the public areas that we are talking about that that would be applied to this. He’s not off the hook for those other things.”
The “swap” of funding also meant that the township could control the upgrades at Butler and Norristown without waiting for developer timing, as they now would be responsible for the project’s permits and progress.
“Because this is our project, there will be [a process], put out for public bid, the board awards bid, will keep those interested up to date, but agenda will be obvious,” said Ferguson.
Suzanne McCarthy, who said she lives close by to this intersection on Butler Pike, was “grateful everyone took time” to make these changes.
“I know it’s been going on for a long time, but there was an accident last week,” said McCarthy. “The skids and crashes and ambulances … it is very real, and I appreciate you taking this so seriously. It will help in a lot of ways.”
