West Mississippi Avenue Pilot Traffic Calming Project

Lakewood is launching a pilot project to evaluate ways to address speeding along the streets with higher traffic volumes in neighborhoods, and the first section of roadway to be evaluated is West Mississippi Avenue from Pierce Street to Sheridan Boulevard. The city is installing semi-permanent safety items to test their effectiveness, and we need your feedback.

Please participate in this project in the following ways:

• Give your feedback on the project.
• Watch a video about speed cushions.
• Review the "About this project" section.
• See what traffic calming measures will be used.
• Learn about the traffic counts and crashes.
• Ask a question.
• Check the project timeline.
• See how this project fits with other traffic safety initiatives.

About this project

This segment from Pierce to Sheridan has been chosen because it has a higher number of crashes than similar roadways (see crash information). It’s also a segment where people are walking or cycling, making it important to prevent serious crashes involving these nonmotorized users of the transportation system. This segment has also received a number of complaints from residents about speeding.

The pilot project involves installing speed cushions, median islands and pedestrian and bicycling crossings in various sections between Pierce and Sheridan. The speed cushions will include wheel slots to allow West Metro Fire vehicles to travel through without having to slow down significantly, resulting in minimal impact to the fire response. West Metro Fire has reviewed and approved the design for this pilot project. The tire slots, however, don’t work for standard vehicles, and drivers will have to slow to travel over the speed cushions.

Once these items are fully installed, the city will evaluate their effectiveness based on changes in driver behavior, feedback and analysis of any crashes. The results of this analysis will be posted here on the project’s webpage when they are available.