By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Chris Mullins from 612 West 24th Avenue spoke about an issue on a street close to him at the Hutchinson City Council meeting Tuesday.
"Back in November on the 30th, my daughter and I were involved in what most would consider a very serious car accident," Mullins said. "We walked out. We were healthy, minor cuts, bruises, things like that. The root cause of that accident was that it was an uncontrolled intersection. We were about a 1/4 of a mile from home. We were at the intersection of Heather and Van Buren."
After the accident, Mullins talked to the local residents to ask them if they thought a stop sign should be there.
"I would like to have a stop sign put there," Mullins said. "That way, we can continue to travel that road. When I talked to the locals, they said they've seen a lot of near misses, they've seen kids almost get hit, they've seen people walking their dogs almost get hit. It's a very, very dangerous intersection. It's a very busy intersection. I did reach out to the city. For the most part, the answer that I got was, based off of probability, that individual did not feel the need to put a stop sign there."
City Manager Jeff Cantrell told the governing body that it is their decision to make.
"If approved, if we did do something, it would not be consistent with policy," Cantrell said. "It would involve you all in doing something that would be kind of a one-off."
The problem with that is it could create multiple situations across the city that are as bad or worse coming before the governing body one at a time. Council member Jon Daveline noted that there was a similar situation up on Tyler Street in the Old Farm Estates. He explained what was done up there.
"In the end, there were additional yield signs at two of the intersections," Daveline said. "That seemed to help somewhat. Rather than just to completely close our minds and say they don't meet the criteria, I certainly have empathy with you concerns. Working through the bureaucracy is certainly a challenge and if we deviate from it, we deviate from it."
No final decision was made, but council members were encouraged to go up and drive the neighborhood themselves before making a final decision.