ST. LOUIS — City officials on Wednesday announced plans to put $3.5 million into reshaping 10 of the city’s most dangerous intersections.
Scott Ogilvie, who oversees the city’s Complete Streets program, said staff surveyed locations across the city and pored over statistics on injury and fatal crashes to identify targets, which included:
• Broadway & Washington Avenue;
• Grand Boulevard and Forest Park Avenue;
• Gravois Avenue and Russell Boulevard;
• Grand Boulevard, Martin Luther King Drive, and Evans Avenue;
• Broadway and Walnut Street;
• Kingshighway and Lindell Boulevard;
• North Florissant Avenue and Palm Street;
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• Kingshighway and Delmar Boulevard;
• South Grand Boulevard and Gravois; and
• Lindell Boulevard and Whittier Street.
Ogilvie said the intersections selected tended to be on wider streets, at the intersection of two bus routes, and near bus stops. The intersection of Grand and Forest Park was also the location of a high-profile collision that killed four teenagers and critically injured four more in February.
The improvements are part of a larger effort to slow down speeders and cut down on the kinds of deadly collisions that have grabbed headlines over the past year. Mayor Tishaura O. Jones last fall called for putting more than $40 million in federal pandemic aid toward fixing intersections, thoroughfares and other areas of particular concern to the city, including:
• Goodfellow Boulevard between Lilian Avenue and Halls Ferry Road.
• Kingshighway between Lindell and Martin Luther King;
• Fourth Street from Chouteau Avenue to Convention Plaza;
• the 6700 block of Chippewa Street, near Ted Drewes; and
• South Grand between Utah Street and Chippewa Street.
The latter two areas saw some of the highest-profile traffic violence the city has seen in recent years. Two pedestrians were killed crossing Chippewa in front of the Ted Drewes frozen custard stand last summer, while the area around the South Grand business district saw a one driver run a red light and hit a pedestrian, and another hit a cyclist in a bike line.
Officials said construction of the improvements, which could include new medians, traffic circles and bumped-out curbs, will largely occur in 2025 and 2026. The city also plans to repave and improve safety on five major thoroughfares — Kingshighway, Jefferson Avenue and Grand, Union and Goodfellow boulevards — on the same schedule.
