As part of its Safety Action Plan, the City of Noblesville has committed to eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2050 through its Noblesville Towards Zero resolution. It was approved at the Feb. 13 Noblesville City Council meeting.
Project Manager in the Engineering Department Andrew Rodewald said the Safety Action Plan will provide:
- Information on Noblesville’s high-injury network, or intersections or segments of roadways within the city that have the highest percentage of overall fatality and serious injury crashes.
- Capital projects recommended to be completed.
- Various countermeasures to be used in the future, like signage, striping and lighting.
- Recommendations on various policies and programs that could be implemented in coordination with public safety, schools, health care and local residents.
The high-injury network includes, but is not limited to, Ind. 37; Greenfield Avenue; Boden Road; Olio Road; 8th street; 10th Street; and Logan Street.
Rodewald said Noblesville received federal highway funding in 2023 through Safe Streets and Roads For All to put together a Safety Action Plan. Rodewald said the primary goal of the plan is to reduce fatalities and serious injury on Noblesville’s roadway network.
“Our fatalities in Noblesville were averaging about three a year over the last five years and it’s held relatively level, which is a good thing considering our growth has gone up, so fatalities proportional to population has gone down,” Rodewald said. “But three is still too many, and as our population grows, we don’t want to let those fatalities keep creeping up.”
The Noblesville Towards Zero resolution is a commitment by the city to create a Safety Action Plan and move forward with reducing vehicular and pedestrian fatalities on its roadways, Rodewald said. After the Safety Action Plan is completed, the city can begin implementing projects and strategies from the plan.
“The Safety Action Plan is not just looking at roadway geometry-type things with a roundabout, for example,” Rodewald said. “It’s also going to look at signage on roads, striping of roads, public safety response time, public education, driver’s education, reducing drunk driving incidents or high speed, unsafe motorist-type of actions that aren’t always the fault of the roadway.”
Rodewald said a draft of the Safety Action Plan will be complete by the end of this month and the final draft should be completed sometime in March.
