DANVERS — Based on the way the numbers were trending, something had to be done at the Route 128/Route 62 interchange.

“We felt somebody was going to die,’’ said Diane Langlais, chairwoman of the Danvers Board of Selectmen.

Changes made in July by the state Department of Transportation — including adding signs and traffic lights — have worked. The number of accidents during the first four months since then has dropped significantly, and there were none in the section identified as the most dangerous: the turn from Route 62 heading east across two lanes of westbound traffic onto the ramp to Route 128 north.

The next step, Langlais said, is fixing the traffic backups. “That’s what we’d like to see looked at again,’’ she said.

Since it was redesigned and reconstructed in 2012, the interchange at Exit 22 off Route 128 has been a target of criticism by motorists frustrated by heavy traffic on Route 62, with accidents and traffic backups increasing significantly as a result of the reconfiguration.

Some residents have had difficulty turning from side streets onto Route 62. They also face delays turning left onto Liberty Street from Route 62 eastbound, toward Beverly.

“These residents have no green arrow for the turn and are consistently facing two lanes of head-on traffic from Route 62 westbound,’’ said Danvers Police Chief Patrick Ambrose.

“We’ve discussed different things with MassDOT, and are still working on it, trying to get it rectified. We’ve significantly decreased the accidents [with the July changes] so have increased the safety, that number one concern. But we had a congestion problem and now it’s even worse.’’

Dotti McBournie lives on Route 62 near the Danversport Yacht Club. “It’s horrible,’’ she said. “It’s constantly backed up.’’

Just getting onto Route 62 from their driveway is so time-consuming, her husband, David, will instead turn right and drive east through Salem and Peabody — more than 7½ miles — to get to work in Danvers Square as opposed to driving the direct route, which is just over a mile away.

“I think a lot of people thought it looked nice on paper, but in the real world it didn’t work out as well,’’ said Ambrose. “That’s just unfortunate, because now we have a mess up there, and they’re trying to do what they can to straighten it out.’’

When the redesigned, $23 million intersection opened in June 2012, accidents nearly doubled. According to the Danvers police, collisions jumped from 67 in 2011 to 109 in 2015. Those figures do not include crashes handled by State Police.

Ambrose noted the severity of the collisions also changed, “from fender-bender, rear-end accidents to significant side-impact crashes on [Route] 62, trying to get onto one of the ramps.’’

Many of those accidents occurred at the left turn from Route 62 (Elliott Street) onto the ramp to Route 128 north, heading toward Gloucester. A driver in one of two lanes traveling west at the intersection would wave through a driver in the eastbound lane seeking a left turn onto Route 128; the driver taking the ramp risked heading into the path of a car continuing on Route 62 in the second westbound lane.

“Initially, we were trying to give it some time to see whether it was an operator issue, being unfamiliar going through the area,’’ Ambrose said. “Over time it didn’t decrease, and traffic enforcement didn’t make an impact.’’

Officials have met with the state since late 2013, when the Department of Transportation commissioned a safety study on the interchange. But the key meeting came in May of this year. A large group that included Ambrose, MassDOT District 4 highway director Paul Stedman, state Representative Ted Speliotis, and state Senator Joan Lovely met to discuss changes. They included a red arrow turning from Route 62 onto Route 128 north — eliminating the driver’s option to yield or turn — with lights that stop all oncoming traffic, and a blinking yellow light from Route 62 west to the ramp for Route 128 south.

After the changes went into effect in July, Danvers Police reported a dramatic decrease in accidents, from an average of 11 per month to a total of just 17 from July through October.

“Our numbers have significantly dropped since they made the changes,’’ said Ambrose.

According to a report by Sarah Slavin of the Police Department, 61 percent of the accidents at the site in the first six months of 2016 involved someone turning left onto the highway on-ramp. In the 17 accidents that occurred in the next four months, none identified the turn as a factor.

“What makes this even more gratifying is that this was a combined effort of all the stakeholders,’’ said Stedman, of MassDOT. “It certainly makes these types of issues a lot easier to deal with when it’s not an adversarial relationship, but one of collaboration.’’

David Rattigan can be reached at drattigan.globe@gmail.com.