Is Lacey’s Ruddell Road unsafe? The answer may surprise you

On May 3, two friends riding motorcycles returned to the Lacey area after visiting a bar in downtown Olympia.

When they reached Ruddell Road, the night took a violent turn.

One of those motorcyclists, a 23-year-old man from Lacey, raced southbound down Ruddell just after 9:30 p.m. While the posted speed limit is 35 mph, a Thurston County Sheriff’s deputy who was northbound on Ruddell estimated the man’s speed at 80 mph, which was later confirmed by a police investigation, according to police records requested by The Olympian.

As a 45-year-old Federal Way man was turning left from Koala Street onto Ruddell Road, that motorcycle crashed into his SUV. He was unhurt, but the motorcyclist was seriously injured and later flown to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

The incident raised fresh concerns about speeding drivers and safety on Ruddell, leading one resident to email The Olympian: “There are way too many wrecks on Ruddell Road and also College Street. ... Let’s pray people slow down.”

But such injury collisions aren’t all that common on Ruddell Road, said Lacey Police Chief Dusty Pierpoint, partly because its traffic volumes aren’t as heavy as some other Lacey arterials. For example, Ruddell has about 17,000 daily vehicle trips, compared to 30,000 on College Street, Pierpoint said.

“It’s not in our top 5 for injury accidents,” Pierpoint said.

But drivers do speed on Ruddell, said Davie Scott, a Lacey traffic officer who monitors the street. One reason: when College Street — another nearby north-south arterial —becomes congested, drivers seek a faster alternative. Ruddell also has a fewer traffic signals, and is near a high school, he said.

But through what Scott called “education, engineering and enforcement,” Lacey police and the city keep close tabs on the road, he said.

500 TRAFFIC STOPS

Lacey police have made 500 traffic stops and issued more than 300 infractions for speeding on Ruddell Road this year. Those that didn’t get a ticket received a warning about how fast they were going and how that speed can affect driver reaction times, Scott said.

Ruddell, too, has southbound and northbound speed reflector signs that show drivers how fast they are going.

In 2011, the city also reduced speeds on Ruddell to 35 mph from 40 mph and narrowed its lanes, said Lacey engineer Roger Schoessel. That was in response to an incident that he thinks has shaped the perception of Ruddell Road.

In December 2010, a man blew through the intersection at 45th Avenue Southeast and Ruddell Road and crashed into a mobile home, killing a 16-year-old boy in his bedroom, who was busy texting his friends.

“Things like that become legendary,” Schoessel said.

Narrowing lanes can cause drivers to slow their speeds, while wider lanes can entice drivers to drive faster, he said. The city experienced that with Willamette Drive in northeast Lacey, which finally led the City Council to cut speeds to 35 mph from 40 mph along that street, as well as build a roundabout at Willamette and 31st and propose one for Willamette and Hogum Bay Road. That roundabout is now under construction.

800 COLLISIONS A YEAR

For the past decade, Lacey has had about 800 vehicle collisions per year, said city transportation manager Martin Hoppe, who shared that information with the Lacey City Council’s transportation committee. Former problem spots include the Willamette Drive, as well as Marvin Road near the roundabout at Britton Parkway. That area was recently widened by the city.

But the intersection of Martin Way and College Street remains a challenge, he said. That intersection is home to 60,000-70,000 vehicle trips a day. A combination of the spacing between traffic signals, as well as congestion, has produced 200 collisions in that area over the past three years, or about 60-70 a year, mostly of the fender-bender variety, Officer Scott said.

The solution is to build a new Interstate 5 interchange at Exit 109 at Martin Way. City Manager Scott Spence described it as a “shovel-ready project” that right now lacks funding. On the other hand, Exit 111, a new interchange at Marvin Road, is funded and moving forward.

In terms of reducing injury accidents, roundabouts, in most cases, are much preferred to traffic signals. Hoppe said crashes at a traffic signal produce injuries about 20 percent to 30 percent of the time, while the injury rate at a roundabout falls into the single digits.

But roundabouts aren’t always the solution, he said.

The city elected to stick with a traffic signal at Balustrade Boulevard and Yelm Highway, which is near the Horizon Pointe subdivision. That’s because there were concerns that people driving into the city on Yelm Highway at 50 mph would not see the roundabout in time to slow down and navigate the circle, he said.

THE MOTORCYCLIST

Lacey police followed up with the 23-year-old motorcyclist who was injured in May after he was released from the hospital, but the man said he couldn’t remember the incident because he suffered a traumatic brain injury, according to the records requested by The Olympian.

Although he and his friend went to a bar that night, medical records show he had a blood alcohol content of .073, which is lower than the legally impaired level of .08. Police later recommended a citation for reckless driving.

This story was originally published October 28, 2017 at 8:50 AM with the headline "Is Lacey’s Ruddell Road unsafe? The answer may surprise you."