Swampscott traffic board presents plan for safer intersection

SWAMPSCOTT – In Swampscott police officer Lt. Gary Lord’s opinion, the Monument Avenue-Humphrey Street-Burrill Street intersection is the worst in town, prone to the highest amount of accidents.At an open forum held by the Traffic Study Committee Tuesday, the committee including Lord, Town Accountant Dave Castellarin and Department of Public Works Director Gino Cresta, presented a plan to make the hazardous intersection a safer place in which the merge from Burrill Street to Humphrey Street will be eliminated.”We break the accident statistics down by the year, and I will tell you it’s very high for the town,” said Lord. He added that compared to the Humphrey Street-Atlantic Avenue merging intersection, the intersection in question was much worse, with pedestrian accidents and even a rollover in its recent history.The plan came from just one of the designs drawn by Metropolitan Area Planning Council, which were paid for with a grant to fix the intersection. The committee chose the design instead of the more extreme options that included rotaries and traffic lights. Per the plan, drivers turning onto Humphrey Street from Burrill Street or Monument Avenue (heading toward Marblehead) will use the Monument Avenue-Humphrey Street corner for a left turn instead of the merge from Burrill, which Lord said will allow for better visibility with a sharp right angle instead of the “over-the-shoulder” maneuver. “This will eliminate that neck-break movement to get into traffic,” said Lord.Rumble strips or raised cobble stones will keep drivers from the merge but still allow emergency vehicles to use it for easy access.Removing the merge will only affect the traffic moving toward Marblehead. Drivers headed to Lynn will use the right turn on Monument Avenue as usual. The merge’s elimination will also allow for what Castellarin called a “safe haven” for drivers turning left from Humphrey onto Monument Avenue, a small space between the rumble strips and the town monument.Castellarin said the move could take some getting used to, but there will be law enforcement in the intersection until everything is running smoothly, along with signage, arrows, and the streets painted to reflect the changes. “Hopefully, it will be pretty easy to get in the intersection,” he said.The committee estimated the changes will cost about $10,000 that the town would take from the $50,000 open space budget.Resident Dan Cobbett, who was among about 12 others at the meeting, said he thought the new changes would look terrible at the entrance to town. “I never knew it was a big accident area,” he said. “But it’s the gateway to the town, and it’s going to add a lot of things that will change the appeal.”Cobbett’s wife, Roberta, said she was relieved the changes were much less drastic than she had imagined they would be. “It’s a busy area,” she said. “Anything that cuts down accidents is key.”Lord said the plans would try to avoid pulling parking spaces or moving the Humphrey Street bus stop to stay “as business-friendly as possible.”The intersection redesign will come before the Board of Selectmen on Wednesday, June 5 for a vote to pursue the new design. Once approved, it will be up to Cresta to put the work out to bid. Castellarin said residents will have until July to submit ideas for the intersection to the committee.Kait Taylor can be reached at [email protected].