Improvements to Issaquah Hobart Road Traffic Timing included in King County Budget

October 31, 2017

Summary

The budget addition will fund the King County Road Services Division’s installation of traffic monitoring that will allow remote traffic light timing adjustments.

Story

Traffic on Issaquah-Hobart Road has been an ongoing issue for some time. Metropolitan King County Council Vice Chair Reagan Dunn announced that funds in the King County Budget will be directed toward improving traffic signal timing in and around Issaquah-Hobart Road.

“I’ve heard from many residents and I know first-hand from sitting in traffic how congested the Issaquah Hobart Road Corridor is,” Dunn said. “This interim solution is a good step forward to work to improve traffic with our limited resources.”

Dunn announced that $140,000 would be included to improve traffic signaling along the Issaquah-Hobart Road Corridor. The budget addition will fund the King County Road Services Division’s installation of traffic monitoring that will allow remote traffic light timing adjustments.

The Division will also coordinate with road engineers from the City of Issaquah to time traffic lights inside city limits on roads that feed into Issaquah-Hobart Road.

These funds were introduced and passed at the October 25 meeting of the Council’s Budget and Finance Management Committee. It is anticipated that the full County Council will vote on the proposed budget in November.

Last spring, Dunn advocated for the County to fund a joint study with the City of Issaquah to find solutions to the traffic congestion in the Issaquah-Hobart Road Corridor, from Issaquah-Hobart Road SE/Front Street between State Route 18 and Gilman Boulevard.

Since the results of the study aren’t due until May of 2018, the proposed funds will go toward improving traffic signaling as an interim solution to this ongoing issue.