SEQUIM — City officials may feel they’re going around and around on the issue.
But a pair of community forums Thursday helped clear up confusion over a new “roundabout,” or traffic circle, placed in front of the Wal-Mart store under construction on the west side of town.
Mayor Walt Schubert said he felt it was important to educate drivers about the safety and cost benefits of the roundabout, which slows traffic and guides it around a round cement enclosure.
About 25 people, all older than 60, attended the afternoon session to view a video demonstrating a roundabout placed in Thurston County and a slideshow narrated by Public Works Director Jim Bay.
The event took place at Guy Cole Convention Center in Carrie Blake Park.
Some of the public have expressed concerns over the safety of the largely unregulated traffic circle.
Questions answered
For the most part, those who left Thursday afternoon were satisfied that their questions were answered.
Others were unhappy, including Diana Verner of Sequim.
Verner questioned the city’s maintenance plans for vegetation planted inside the traffic circle, as well as a figure thrown out by Bay indicating that roundabouts reduce traffic “conflict points” — or collisions and near-misses — by about 76 percent over intersections controlled by stoplights.
“I would like to dig further into that with you, Jim, because I don’t believe it,” Verner said in front of the crowd.
Bay said he would welcome a visit from Verner — or anyone — to his office in the Planning and Public Works building.
The roundabout, finished in July, was chosen as one of two traffic-control measures to ease congestion at a spot where three large commercial developments are due to open for business in the next year.
Besides Wal-Mart and Sequim Village Marketplace — a regional shopping center anchored by Home Depot and planned for a site just across from Wal-Mart near West Washington Street and River Road — the city has issued preliminary permitting for a three-story hotel and a national chain restaurant just south of those two sites.