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Santa Rita RoadNalley Avenue Intersection Considerable discussion has focused on the issue of the traffic congestion and mitigations at the intersection on Santa Rita Road and Valley Avenue. This intersection is currently operating at unacceptable levels (LOS E in the pm), and the identified mitigation is to add a triple southbound left turn lane from Santa Rita onto Valley and to add a second westbound left turn lane from Valley onto Santa Rita. However, the south bound triple left turn mitigation is not necessary at build-out, when the Stoneridge Drive Extension would shift enough east-west traffic from Valley Avenue to Stoneridge Drive to improve the performance of the Santa RitaNalley intersection. In addition, residents in the vicinity of this intersection have expressed that they are not in support of adding a third left turn lane as they believe that this would result in more traffic and would compromise pedestrian safety. The Council has indicated that the triple left turn lane should be deleted as a mitigation in the Circulation Element. It should be noted that the addition of a triple left turn lane does not increase the amount of traffic using Valley Avenue. Instead, less green time for the left turn movement will be necessary to move the same number of cars through the intersection, resulting in more green time for the through cars on Santa Rita Road. The intersection level of service will improve without increasing the number of cars using Valley Avenue. Since allowing any new development in that area would further degrade the performance of the Santa RitaNalley intersection, staff suggests taking a flexible approach to this intersection in the General Plan in order to allow appropriate development in the area to occur. For example, an alternate use to the Home Depot project may be proposed on the Stanley/Valley/Bernal site and supported by the community and the City Council. Although this proposal may continue the congestion at Santa RitaNalley in the short-term, until the Stoneridge Drive Extension is constructed, the Council may wish to have the flexibility of approving an otherwise desirable project without necessarily requiring the third left turn lane at Santa RitaNalley. Since that intersection is linked to the Stoneridge Drive extension and the Stoneridge Drive extension is linked to improvements on I-580 and Rt. 84, the Council may decide that it can accept the existing situation at Santa RitaNalley in the short-term in exchange for a desirable project at Stanley/Valley/Bernal (or another site) and a regional traffic solution in the long-term. Therefore, staff recommends retaining the third left turn lane at Santa RitaNalley in the General Plan subject to Program 2.3 which would give the Council the flexibility of either requiring or not requiring this mitigation. The "conditional LOS" program for this intersection states the following: The Santa Rita Road/Valley Avenue intersection is conditionally exempted from the City's LOS D policy in that the mitigation of adding a third southbound left turn lane is a short term mitigation, with the build-out mitigation being the Stoneridge Drive extension. The City Council shall decide if and when this intersection modification is needed in conjunction with development projects which add traffic to it. Projects which add traffic but are not required to improve this intersection will continue to pay their Traffic Improvement Fees and will be considered to have mitigated their impact at the Santa Rita Road/Valley Avenue intersection on that basis. Page4of7