North First Street Revitalization Project
The City of Yakima, Washington proposes to construct mobility, safety and freight enhancements in the North First Street corridor. City partnerships for this important project include Yakima County, the Yakima Valley Conference of Governments, Yakima Transit, the WSDOT, and the Washington Surface Transportation Program. Key project components include providing a safe pedestrian environment including the construction of new sidewalks, pedestrian lighting and landscaping. Access management will close or restrict unnecessary driveways to reduce vehicular turning movements. The project will improve intersection radii to accommodate freight truck movements and reduce the locations where trucks currently traverse sidewalk curbs in order to turn. Landscaping will provide green infrastructure opportunities to the corridor.
This project includes the complete reconstruction of nearly 1.5 miles of North 1st Street, a principal arterial. The project will remove on-street parking; street lighting will be enhanced and changed over to LED lighting, add pedestrian lighting; construct many 100 foot segments of boulevard median islands; install various pedestrian and decorative elements such as enhanced landscaping along the side of the roadway. Bike facilities will be added to 1st Street which connects to a regional bicycle and pedestrian trail. This project will entice commercial development by providing safe and updated wide pedestrian corridors that are currently dark and have deteriorated sidewalk and minimal ADA amenities. Improvements also include storm water quality and drainage improvements. Safety improvements at signalized intersections will reduce right angle collisions. Construction will include a roundabout at “H” Street instead of a traffic signal to reduce emissions resulting from stop delay of traffic. The “H” Street Roundabout will connect to the upcoming “Sawmill Redevelopment Project”, a LIFT-funded project of 225 acres.
