School Circulation and Safety Project
The Project:
Starting in the Fall of 2022, Kittelson and Associates, Inc. began working closely with the Philomath City Council, Philomath School Board, and city and school district staff to identify issues and solutions related to circulation around the school campuses within Philomath.
History:
During development of the 2018 Transportation System Plan (TSP) in Philomath, numerous concerns arose regarding the circulation of people, school buses and vehicles around the Philomath schools. While the schools do not physically sit on the same property, their close proximity to each other (1 -2 blocks) results in their function more as a single campus then individual sites. This collective school “campus” is integrated into the local street network and neighborhood, as well as popular through routes for freight and vehicular traffic traveling south in Benton County.
A project to further study school circulation was added to the Financially Constrained Project List of the TSP, demonstrating the priority of the issues identified by the community. In 2019, the City of Philomath submitted a request to the Corvallis Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO) to fund Ts-1, the School Circulation and Safety Study. The project was funded, and CAMPO staff agreed to work with the city in collaboration with a technical consultant to complete the study. While the project initially received funding in 2020, staffing transitions at the school district and CAMPO and a lack of school-related traffic present during the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the actual project kickoff until 2022. With the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year came a renewed focus on conflicts between vehicles, pedestrians and school buses. The project team used a combination of public engagement, field observations and technical analysis to develop recommendations for the area.
Process:
Following a public survey, on-site observations, data collection, and meetings with stakeholders including the City Council and School Board, Kittelson produced a report titled, Philomath School Circulation and Safety Report in March 2023. Following its release, the City Council and School Board met to prioritize projects that address each of the four problem areas focused on in the report. Some of the recommended projects have already been completed, are already planned and funded, or are in the planning and funding phase.
The full report can be found below. Specific projects will be incorporated into the City’s three-year Capital Improvement Plan as funding becomes available.