Conway traffic tamer waiting on tulips

Construction will resume on the roundabout at Conway’s tricky five-point intersection on May 1, said Dan Berentson, Skagit County’s interim Public Works director.

The county doesn’t want to have roadwork snarling traffic during the Tulip Festival, Berentson said.

For La Conner residents, Conway’s intersection of Fir Island Road and Pioneer Highway is part of the regular route to Seattle or to Stanwood.

At the stop sign on Fir Island Road and the highway, motorists turn left to go to Interstate 5 toward Seattle and right to go to Stanwood. But just west of the big intersection, two side streets feed into Fir Island Road — Main Street on the south and Conway Frontage Road on the north.

The new roundabout — which is actually going to be a giant oval about 170 by 210 feet — will greatly reduce the number of potential accident sites by funneling traffic into orderly lanes.

County officials have said the intersection sees upwards of 14,000 car trips per day. With the elimination of the stop sign on Fir Island Road, Conway will likely experience fewer traffic backups when the Tulip Festival comes around again next year.

And there should be fewer accidents. Last May after a section of the Interstate 5 bridge over the Skagit River collapsed, lots of traffic was going through Conway to get around the freeway closure. Washington State Trooper Sean O’Connell died while working to control traffic on the approach to that troublesome intersection.

The county has obtained a $2 million federal grant to build the roundabout. County traffic engineering technician Given Kutz said the work will be finished “we expect, by the end of June.”

Preliminary work on the new roundabout was begun last fall but shut down for the winter so that people wouldn’t have to drive through a muddy, possibly frozen, mess when the existing road is dug up.

To give residents the latest information on the roundabout, traffic updates and other issues affecting Conway, county officials are holding a community meeting at 6 p.m. Monday at the Conway Elementary School library. The school is located at 19710 State Highway 534.

Berentson said the county has been working with Mount Vernon High School metal working class to produce art for the roundabout.

He said renderings of proposed sculptures depicting subjects such as geese and swans will be presented at Monday’s meeting.