The campus community is invited to virtually tour concept designs for University Drive though the heart of campus. The designs include a protected bike lane, a two-way cycle track with landscaped medians, floating transit islands, and enhanced pedestrian crossings, all shown in a virtual environment on the project website.
The project began in 2019 when Boise State approached the Ada County Highway District (ACHD) about re-designing University Drive between Chrisway Drive and Lincoln Avenue. The primary goal is to create a safer environment for all modes of travel.
The concept designs rely on a lane reallocation, reducing the existing five vehicle lanes to three. The two extra travel lanes could then be reallocated to implement a series of safety-conscious improvements for pedestrian, bicycle and transit infrastructure. This will modernize the corridor and integrate it into the campus and community in a way that accommodates all current and future users.
A traffic impact study was conducted and gave the ACHD Commission confidence that a reallocation could occur without major detriment to traffic or operations. Still, ACHD owns University Drive and they hold the ultimate authority for any approved designs. As such, they encouraged Boise State to conduct a robust engagement effort to generate any proposed designs. That process was launched with the formation of a community stakeholder group including representatives from the university administration, the student body, neighborhood groups and regional transit partners.
The results of this design collaboration can now be seen on the project web page created by the university’s design consultant, Kittelson and Associates.
Members of the campus community are strongly encouraged to provide feedback on the proposals through the survey link found on the project web page.
The project feedback form will be available to the public until Jan. 10, 2021.
