MoDOT carries out safety study of Highway 36 in Northwest Missouri
ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (News-Press NOW) -- State officials are pressing ahead with an in-depth corridor study designed to improve driver safety along one of Missouri's historic and unique highways.
Planners and engineers with the Missouri Department of Transportation are currently in the midst of a monthslong examination of U.S. Route 36, a roughly 110-mile stretch of roadway from Riverside Road in St. Joseph to the Macon and Linn County line.
The $160,000 project will study traffic crash patterns, roadway designs and sections such as clear zones, a safety buffer designed to minimize the risk of serious accidents when a driver veers off the road.
"We've had about three fatality crashes on U.S. Route 36 per year over the last 10 years," MoDOT Northwest District Planning Manager Adam Wood said. "We also are having about 10 serious injury crashes per year. So that's the primary reason of looking at this study."
U.S. Route 36, a four-lane east-west roadway, connects a variety of cities along a 195-mile stretch in Northwest Missouri from Hannibal, Macon, Marceline, Hamilton and St. Joseph.
Wood said the highway -- originally laid out in the 1910s and designated in 1926 -- has several substandard components that need to be evaluated.
“We're looking at places where maybe the shoulders aren't as wide as what our current day standard is," Wood said. "We're looking at crash history, specific locations where maybe we have more crashes than what we would desire. And then just the old alignment versus the new alignment."
The highway was originally built as a two-lane roadway and gradually expanded over the following decades. A significant modernization project to convert the entire route to a four-lane highway was capped off in 2010 with a $75.5 million project to expand 52 miles of U.S. 36 between Macon and Hannibal.
"Parts of the road are still the old two-lane road that was originally there. And parts of them are the new," Wood said "We just want to simply make the highway safe for the traveling public."
The storied highway is prominently known in Missouri as “The Way of the American Genius” for its connection with historic figures such as Mark Twain, Walt Disney, John J. Pershing and Jesse James, among others.
MoDOT is expected is to have the study complete by the end of the calendar year. Wood said the study is not connected to past discussions about potentially converting the highway into an interstate.
"After the study is complete it gives us a chance to publicize it a little bit more and show people within MoDOT, our representatives, make it stand out on our unfunded needs list," he said. “At that time we can start focusing on finding some funds to make some of these things happen."
