News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
A new extension of Hood Avenue will more closely resemble a city street than a state highway following a joint session of the Deschutes County Planning Commission and the Sisters Planning Commission Thursday, May 8.
Pine Meadow Ranch Development's proposed extension will run west across the northern portion of the ranch and turn to link up in a 90-degree intersection with Highway 242. Planners also approved redesignating the road as a "collector" street instead of an "arterial," or highway.
Sisters planner Neil Thompson told a joint meeting of the county and city planning commissions that the current Sisters Comprehensive Plan, adopted in 1979, called for an extension of Hood Avenue with the possibility of using it as part of a one-way couplet. That planned extension linked up with Highway 242 at a shallow angle and swept across the ranch property in a high-speed curve.
PMR's proposal changes the alignment of Hood Avenue to a 90-degree intersection. The extension would eventually connect with a Forest Service road running from Highway 20 to Highway 242 across the agency's planned scenic byway portal.
According to the Forest Service, the portal road will replace Sentry Drive, which links Highway 242 with the Threewind Shopping Center.
Thompson testified that redesignating Hood Avenue as a "collector" -- a local street -- rather than an "arterial" is in line with Sisters residents' rejection of a couplet.
Howard Paine of the Alliance for Responsible Land Use in Deschutes County, argued that the redesignation limits Sisters' options for coping with traffic.
"There's got to be some long-term solution to Sisters' long-term transportation traffic problems," Paine testified. "We believe that redesignating Hood (Avenue) effectively closes off any future possibility of a couplet."
However, Paine said ARLU DeCO supports the realignment of the street.
Representatives of the Forest Service, the Oregon Department of Transportation and county transportation manager Steve Jorgensen all testified in favor of the project.
Sisters area resident Robert Shaw testified that the realignment would allow motorists to bypass the dangerous "Y" intersection at Highway 242 and Highway 20.
In a letter he read to the commissioners, Shaw wrote, "Without a doubt the proposed realignment of Hood (Avenue) will minimize or eliminate the need for westbound motorists to cross the 'kamikaze' intersection... This is the best proposal submitted in recent years for diffusing and calming peak use traffic on Cascade (Avenue)."
The proposal is set to go before the Deschutes County Board of Commissioners and the Sisters City Council for final approval on June 25
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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