It might be the most difficult left turn in Summit County, if not Utah. As Rudy Lehfeldt-Ehlinger explains, the exit ramp can back up onto U.S. 40 all the way to its junction with Interstate 80.
He commutes about 10 miles from Pinebrook to his distillery, Proverbial Spirits, most mornings.
“It took me 45 minutes the other day,” Lehfeldt-Ehlinger said. That’s an average speed of 13 miles per hour.
It’s because of the stop sign at the end of the exit ramp, which is just one lane. The overpass doesn’t have stop signs, so those cars don’t yield.
“You just get one person that's nervous to turn left off that off ramp, and it just backs up really quick,” Deputy Director of Transportation Planning Brandon Brady said.
It’s the area the county receives the most complaints about, and to Lehfeldt-Ehlinger, it’s unsafe.
“I've never seen an accident happen there, but I've seen cars that have recently been in an accident there,” he said. “Because you've been waiting so long, you want to shoot the gap.”
So Brady’s office is trying to fix it. The long-term vision is to transform the exits on either side of the highway from one-way stop signs into roundabouts.
The eastbound exit is the top priority. Brady said the county will install a temporary stoplight there in the next two to three weeks to reduce the exit ramp congestion.
Next year, he hopes to break ground on a roundabout on the eastbound side. Expanding the westbound side’s roundabout is farther off, and will likely happen alongside the construction of the Marketplace at Silver Creek and nearby county services buildings.
“This is kind of an area that's growing in the county, so that's how we're trying to get on top of it,” Brady said.
Traffic is already spilling over into nearby neighborhoods too. Even though the exit ramp is one lane, cars waiting in line will swing around on the shoulder and take a right into Trailside to make a U-turn.
Some have elected to take Highland Drive instead, although Lehfeldt-Ehlinger said that’s been a no-go since utility companies began construction this summer.
He said he’d always hoped they’d put a roundabout at the Silver Summit exit, after seeing how successful it was in his neighborhood.
“You never wait in traffic at Pinebrook anymore, and nothing else changed other than they put in a roundabout,” Lehfeldt-Ehlinger said. “And you used to wait—same game—you used to wait way up the exit.”
He likes Pinebrook's roundabout, because when there's little traffic, he can drive right through instead of waiting at a light.
According to Brady, traffic peaks in the Silver Summit area during morning and afternoon commutes, but also at in-between times, like from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m.
Summit County is working with the Utah Department of Transportation to design a 2-lane roundabout, similar to those in Pinebrook and Jeremy Ranch.
The county hopes to complete the eastbound roundabout design and send out a request for proposal in January or February of 2024. Construction could begin in early summer.
According to Brady, the westbound roundabout could be improved in the next 3 to 5 years.
