MDOT Presents Road Diet Plans

City council will cast its vote on 16 June.

Hillsdale City Hall—The City of Hillsdale hosted a public forum Thursday, 12 June, to relay details about the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) traffic calming plan on M-99 from Carleton to Steamburg.

Planning and Zoning Administrator Alan Beeker described the project, the details of which can be read about in a previous Hillsdalian post.

“In 2023, MDOT approached us,” Beeker said, noting that the traffic calming plans had initially gotten underway before COVID lockdowns, but they were subsequently delayed.

According to Beeker, the “extra pavement” that would remain after changing Broad Street from four to three lanes will be used for bike lanes in order to acquire MDOT’s Transportation Alternative Program (TAP) grant.

If Hillsdale received the TAP grant, preliminary estimates suggest that the city would have to match the state’s $800,000 contribution with $200,000 of its own money.

Economic Development Coordinator Sam Fry also attended the meeting to speak about projected economic benefits that could result from traffic calming.

“There’s a common shared interest in seeing a downtown that’s more active,” Fry said.

“When traffic is moving too fast,” he added, “it’s hard for those businesses to capture customers.”

He also said that slowing traffic could bolster tourism, appealing in particular to tourists who come to town on the railroad several times per year.

“That’s several thousand visitors that are coming into Hillsdale,” he said, noting that some train tourists claimed Hillsdale’s downtown is “not pedestrian-friendly.”

The meeting included a question-and-answer segment wherein attendees wrote questions on notecards, with those questions being read aloud and answered by city staff and MDOT representatives.

During the question period, numerous residents inquired about the traffic projections offered by MDOT, as well as the process by which the road diet has been advanced in the face of increasing public opposition over the past six months.

“The reason that we are pursuing it is because it was something that came out of a study that was encouraged by the group that implemented the study,” Beeker said in response to one question, citing the affirmation of the project by Hillsdale’s past planning commissions and city councils.

Of downtown property owners, Beeker said that some “have expressed approval, and some have not,” though the “majority” was in favor.

As for drivers, “you are going to have a little more delay,” MDOT officials admitted.

City council, which previously elected to continue pursuing the MDOT TAP grant in a 6-2 vote, will decide whether or not to proceed with the project at its next meeting, Monday, 16 June.

Councilman Matthew Bentley, who has led opposition to the road diet for the past six months, attended the meeting. He told the Hillsdalian that the project has been advanced without an ear for the people.

“The questions concerning the legitimacy of the meeting are more important than most of questions that were answered at the meeting,” Bentley said.

“The process was rubberstamped through during its first year, and has been rammed through for the last six months. The malfeasance has only accelerated and intensified in the last month.”

Jacob Bruns

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