Nearby residents expressed concerns recently about the decision to permanently close the Monarch Road traffic median in-between the northbound and southbound lanes of Colo. 119.

Colorado Department of Transportation officials said earlier this week that the median would permanently close on Friday.The intersection previously was a full-movement intersection, meaning drivers and bikers could turn in any direction.

The closure is part of the $165 million Colo. 119 Safety, Mobility and Bikeway project, which is a joint effort between Boulder County, the Colorado Department of Transportation and the Regional Transportation District. Colo. 119 between Boulder and Longmont is also commonly referred to as the Diagonal Highway, and Boulder County government workers refer to the Longmont-bound lanes as northbound lanes and the Boulder-bound lanes as southbound lanes.

Since commuters can no longer cross the Diagonal Highway at Monarch Road, local residents say their travel patterns have changed.

For Mark Winter, who works in the La Vista Place business park next to the Diagonal, the closure brought the need to find a new route to his office. A northbound driver on Colo. 119 must now keep driving to Niwot Road, make a U-turn, and come back down the Diagonal to access the business park.

Winter called it a “major inconvenience.”

“I’ve never considered that intersection dangerous in the least,” Winter said of Colo. 119 and Monarch. “You have turn-off and turn-on lanes; you have great visibility in both directions.”

Winter said he’d like to see the county conduct a study on localized traffic impacts that would happen after the median closure.

“It’s definitely going to have an impact on the surrounding roads, for sure,” Winter said before the closure happened.

Winter joins other local residents in worrying about traffic increases in and around Niwot from the closure. A.J. Killeen, who lives in North Boulder and manages the La Vista Place business park, has gotten used to avoiding the Diagonal with the recent construction happening as part of the CO 119 Safety, Mobility and Bikeway project.

Killeen said he had already noticed an increase in traffic on 51st Street; now, he’s concerned about even more traffic from the Monarch Road closure as drivers search for new routes.

“I’m taking 51st out, which is not a paved road, past the reservoir,” Killeen said of his commute. “And the traffic out there has increased exponentially. Now, people are trying to go at highway speeds down 51st.”

Killeen added that the La Vista business park tenants were given no notice of the closure. The park has 10 condos and around seven unique owners.

“We didn’t get any notice, and we’re the most impacted,” Killeen said.

At the end of December, project leaders held a town hall meeting with the Niwot and surrounding community about the closure. Kathleen Bracke, deputy director of Boulder County Community Planning and Permitting, talked about crash statistics at the Monarch intersection and explained how those numbers influenced the changes.At the meeting, Bracke cited crash data at the intersection from 2015 to 2019. The data shows 33 total crashes along the Diagonal Highway southbound at Monarch Road, and five total crashes northbound at Monarch Road.

For both the northbound and southbound lanes of the highway, broadside crashes made up the majority of crash types.

The broadside crashes happened as drivers tried to cross the Diagonal at Monarch Road, Bracke explained.

“We know change is hard,” Bracke told roughly 15 Niwot community members at the meeting. “Access change is extra hard. We’re not doing it because we want to inconvenience you. We’re doing it because we want to make you safer.”

Going southbound at Monarch Road, 15 of the 23 broadside crashes from 2015 to 2019 resulted in injury. According to the county’s Vision Zero transportation policy, officials want no severe injuries or fatalities on roadways.

“These numbers are people,” Bracke said of the crash data. “These are people being injured and killed at these intersections.”

Bracke said the difference in travel time between the new and old layouts at Monarch Road is four minutes.

“I will trade four minutes for a person’s life any day of the week,” Bracke said.

Alexandra Phillips, a bicycle transportation planner for the county, said Colorado State Patrol field officers are supportive of changes aimed at reducing severe crashes along the corridor.

“When we’re talking about severe crashes, we’re not talking about whiplash,” Phillips said. “Severe crashes are life-altering crashes. And, of course, fatalities or deaths.”

Workers also are making improvements to other intersections along the Diagonal Highway as part of the CO 119 Safety, Mobility and Bikeway project, including at nearby Colo. 52. The project also adds transit stations along the corridor and a commuter bikeway connecting Boulder and Longmont.

Meeting attendees shared various concerns with officials, including the build-up of traffic in Niwot as a result of the closure.

One Estate Circle resident detailed his new route to Boulder: east on Monarch Road, south on North 79th Street, and west on Colo. 52 to reconnect with the Diagonal. He insisted that the route takes longer than the county’s four-minute estimate.

Even though the decision to close the Monarch Road median already had been made, some attendees had hoped the meeting might delay construction. One asked county officials if educating drivers on road safety at four-way intersections could have been a more effective way forward.

Jerry Motley said he has lived in Niwot for 38 years and takes Monarch Road whenever he leaves his subdivision. Like other residents, he said he is anticipating more traffic as a result of the median closure.

“I’m retired, but still, my commute’s affected,” Motley said.