Baseline Road Transportation Safety Project

Work begins in early June 2023 and is expected to end in October 2023. Work is dependent on contractor availability and weather conditions. Expect periodic lane closures, bicycle and pedestrian detours, and potential transit stop relocations as crews conduct work. Visit Cone Zones for all current construction and traffic impacts.

May

Project crews conducted work to repair concrete and curbs along Baseline Road from 28th Street to Foothills Parkway. This includes making curb ramps ADA compliant and making significant repairs to the southwest corner of 30th Street and Baseline.

June

Pavement resurfacing and restriping work begins on Baseline Road from 28th Street to Foothills Parkway. Narrower travel lanes and new or widened bike lane buffers are installed. The eastbound right turn lane from Mohawk Drive to Meadows shopping center is removed.

July to August

Once pavement and resurfacing work is complete, the city installs safety improvements at intersections along the project corridor.

The city separates the bike lane from the vehicle lane with flexible delineator posts. Other first-phase changes like new crosswalks and corner islands, painted curb extensions and green bike lane markings are installed.

Work pauses and resumes in the fall once concrete tall curbs are manufactured, delivered and prepared for installation.

October

The city finishes intersection improvements and replaces some flexible delineator posts with tall curbs at strategic locations along the project corridor.

Phase 1 of the project takes advantage of pre-scheduled pavement resurfacing as part of the city’s Pavement Management Program (PMP) to install improvements sooner using city funds. Phase 2 will include further infrastructure enhancements on Baseline Road after the city receives federal grant funds in 2024.

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Phase 1 (2022-2023)

Paving and Strategic Improvements from 28th Street to Foothills Parkway (City of Boulder Funds)

Changes are informed by what we heard from the community in fall 2022. This includes:

• Narrow and restripe travel lanes, a safety design that has been shown in studies to reduce vehicle speeds.

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• Repave and restripe Mohawk from Baseline Road to Pawnee Drive to better accommodate all travelers to and from Baseline.

• Reorganize intersections by extending the curb and tightening turn radii to shorten pedestrian and bicycle crossing distances, expand the pedestrian area, slow vehicles and improve driver sightlines.
  

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• Provide physical protection to improve comfort and safety at strategic, prioritized parts of the bike lane.

  • “Hardening” of physical protection through concrete tall curbs in strategic areas to replace existing striped buffers or flexible delineator posts.

  • In other places, flexible delineator posts and a striped buffer separate the bike lane.

• Add new crosswalks at the Inca Parkway intersection.

• Add green bike lane markings at intersections.

• Consolidate bus stops to reduce conflicts between bikes and buses and to improve ADA accessibility and pedestrian access to remaining stops.

Phase 2 (2024-2026)

Comprehensive Multimodal Enhancements from 30th Street to Foothills Parkway (Federal Funds)

The city will develop Phase 2 after receiving $3.2 million in federal grant funding from the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) in 2024. These funds will make it possible to create more significant changes to the corridor.

Examples of possible improvements include:

• Complete bike lane protection

• Intersection and pedestrian crossing improvements

• Transit efficiency and safety improvements, such as floating bus islands

• Additional improvements, such as upgrading some Phase 1 improvements to more permanent features

We reached out to hear from people who live, work, shop and travel along Baseline Road through a Be Heard Boulder questionnaire, walking and biking tours of the area, an on-demand open house, emails, office hours and more throughout 2022.

There will be additional community engagement opportunities once Phase 2 planning and design begins.

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What We Heard

Learn more about what we heard during the first phase of community engagement and how your input is shaping the future of safety, comfort and connectivity at Baseline at the Baseline Road Transportation Safety Project On-Demand Open House.

In fall 2022 we analyzed crash data and more than 400 comments from a questionnaire and on-demand open house. We heard from commuters, residents, students, key stakeholders and advocacy organizations that:

• Wide travel lanes encourage speeds higher than the posted limit

• High vehicle travel and turning speeds make walking and biking feel unsafe

• Drivers feel unsafe turning onto or off of the corridor because of other drivers speeding – they’re afraid of being rear-ended or sideswiped

• Distances between marked pedestrian crossings are too long and many people cross in the middle of blocks or at unmarked intersections

• Pedestrian crossing times are short

• People feel unsafe on sidewalks and bike lanes due to turning vehicles

• Rutted pavement and uplifted sidewalk panels pose tripping hazards

• Many transit stops are not accessible and lack shelters, benches, trash cans and secure bicycle parking

• Buses frequently cross bicycle lanes to access transit stops

• People bicycling in the existing bicycle lanes feel unsafe and uncomfortable

Click through the slideshow below or view the On-Demand Open House to see photos of existing conditions on Baseline Road.

Baseline Road is a key corridor for local and regional travel and provides important transportation connections for people who live, work, play and study in Boulder. The section of the road from 30th Street to Foothills Parkway features a number of popular community destinations including grocery stores, shops, senior centers and apartments and is close to both the University of Colorado Boulder's main campus and Williams Village Student Housing.

According to the city's 2022 Safe Streets Report, this section of Baseline Road is one of the top 10 crash locations for people walking and bicycling in the city and has been identified in the Denver Regional Council of Government's Regional High Injury Network as a Critical Corridor. The road was also identified as a Priority Corridor to make improvements on as part of the city's Core Arterial Network (CAN) initiative to improve safety on our high-traffic, higher-speed streets.

The CAN is the connected system of protected bicycle lanes, intersection enhancements, pedestrian facilities, and transit facility upgrades that will help reduce the potential for severe crashes and make it more comfortable and convenient for people to get where they need to go along Boulder’s main corridors.

Additional changes are coming to Baseline Road as part of other ongoing projects.

Related Links

• Safe Streets Report