City approves construction of roundabout near UNK campus

KEARNEY, Neb. (KSNB) – The City of Kearney, NDOT and UNK are participating in a joint project. Kearney City Council has given approval to a design consultant to develop a roundabout at the intersection of University Drive and Highway 30. Approval of the design consultant contract is the first step in this process . A number of projects underway at UNK mean foot traffic will increase.

Public Works Director Andy Harter said he wants to get this project started before the university opens its projects on campus. NDOT thanks UNK for raising this issue years ago because they were aware of the impact of expansion on the city's roads and highways.

NDOT will pay 50 percent of the cost, with the city and university paying their share. This was already on the NDOT agenda.

“This section of road is starting to age,” said Eric Klein, NDOT District 4 construction engineer. “ASR is starting to appear, which is a problem that some concrete mixes have; and we were looking at, you know, we were looking at six years for NDOT and it was starting to be on our radar as something that we had to rebuild anyway.

ASR is a reaction between cement and gravel in concrete and roundabouts limit the conflict points; Furthermore, reducing speed contributes to safety in all cases. According to the NDOT website, roundabouts have been shown to reduce injury crashes by 75 percent and fatal crashes by up to 90 percent. Construction on the project is expected to begin in 2025. Harter said roundabouts are simply safer for everyone involved.

“The safety of vehicle traffic is that it slows it down to a point where there's not a high-speed accident if there is one,” Harter said. “They travel at very low speeds and generally cause only minor damage to vehicles. So for traffic flow, everything happens simultaneously, you don't have stop and go traffic.

University Village is growing rapidly with other campus projects, which University Village Executive Director Michael Christen said makes this project an immediate need.

“The roundabout became the option that allowed traffic to continue moving on Highway 30; but also allow for pedestrian safety with a median island for them to cross,” Christen said. “But it is also a traffic calming measure; so it keeps traffic moving, it keeps Highway 30 moving but slows them down when they get to campus.

The roundabout meets the need for safety for vehicles and pedestrians.

“We looked at these different options of completely stopping traffic in some way or allowing it to continue to move regardless, however that works,” Christen said. “This one was the happy medium for us; allowing traffic to continue to flow, pedestrians still have the option and there are additional phases related to the Highway 30 project.”

Christen said they are also considering additional measures for pedestrian safety in the future.

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