Traffic backups in Walnut Grove lead to roundabout

The recent demolition of the building that had housed Walnut Grove’s former City Hall, post office, fire station and Walton County Sheriff’s Office annex — an iconic brick structure in the small town, filled with memories for many residents and former residents — signaled the beginning of construction of a roundabout at the problematic intersection of Georgia Highways 81 and 138.

The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) project is being built at a cost of just over $10 million by Stone Mountain-based Summit Construction & Development LLC. Right of way acquisition and engineering costs bring the total project cost to just under $15 million, according to GDOT documents.

The roundabout is slated for completion at the end of April in 2027, according to GDOT.

It will replace the current signalized intersection at the major crossroads in Walnut Grove, where traffic backups have become a significant and sustained problem.

According to Walnut Grove Mayor Stephanie Moncrief, the intersection, and all four of its approaches along both Highway 81 and Highway 138, become crowded with traffic at the end of each school day, with backups persisting into the early evening hours.

Beyond the mayor’s informal assessment, a GDOT analysis of the existing intersection notes that crash rates at the location where the two roads currently meet are above the state average. Technically, the GDOT analysis indicates that both the turn angles, and the angles at which the two state highways meet at the intersection, are not up to standard.

In its documentation of the roundabout project, GDOT indicates that a roundabout was chosen as the fix for the traffic volume and technical issues at the existing intersection because it “meets the needs of the project justification to improve safety and operational performance” and “best addresses the crash history, safety considerations and operational issues for this intersection.”

Further according to GDOT, “Properly designed roundabouts improve safety by reducing the number of conflict points and angle crashes which lower the potential for injuries and fatal crashes.”

Not building the roundabout, according to GDOT, would keep the intersection on track to have an “F” level of service — near-gridlock conditions — by 2046. An “F” level of service denotes a “forced flow” of traffic, with volume exceeding road capacity, traffic moving at very low speed and long delays featuring stop-and-go driving.

The roundabout coming to the intersection of Highways 138 and 81 will be a multiple-lane design, with a right-turn bypass lane on its Highway 138 approach routes. The roundabout will be 170 feet in diameter and will feature a landscaped central island. Accommodation for large-truck traffic, which is especially prevalent on Highway 138, is included in the roundabout design, according to GDOT documentation.

Moncrief is enthusiastic about the roundabout coming to Walnut Grove.

“I think it’s going to mean a lot less horrible traffic,” she said in a recent interview.

At the same time, the mayor recognizes the roundabout isn’t universally popular among her constituents.

“I think some people believe in it, some people don’t,” Moncrief said. “We still have some folks who don’t believe in roundabouts at all.”

Moncrief’s view is borne out in comments on the city’s Facebook page.

One woman wrote, “I get the concept of what GDOT thinks is going to happen… but this roundabout is going to be a (expletive) show.” Another woman called the roundabout simply “a bad idea.”

One person simply noted that she “cannot stand roundabouts,” and yet another commenter pledged she “will be avoiding the area and using different routes to go around it for sure.”

In its early planning for the roundabout, GDOT heard numerous public concerns about the roundabout coming to the Walnut Grove intersection. Those concerns included questions about the potential loss of sidewalks along the two highways; the ability of trucks, buses and emergency vehicles to navigate the roundabout; concerns about crashes involving large vehicles or motorists not knowing how to negotiate a roundabout and worries about the project’s cost.

GDOT countered those concerns by noting, in part, that a “capacity analysis confirmed a roundabout provided best functionality” for the busy intersection and further noting that “all existing sidewalks are proposed for reconstruction.” 

On a related note, GDOT’s website makes a case for roundabouts by noting that “at…intersections where roundabouts have been installed to replace existing intersections, accidents of all types have been reduced by over 35 percent, and injury accidents have been reduced by over 60 percent.”

GDOT also uses its website to provide a guide for negotiating roundabouts. Before entering a roundabout, GDOT says, motorists should get into the correct lane and slow down.

Once in the roundabout, motorists should yield to traffic already in it and enter it only when there is a safe distance for merging.

GDOT goes on to tell motorists to travel counterclockwise in a roundabout, and to keep moving through the point where they leave it.

“When inside the roundabout, DO NOT STOP,” instructs the GDOT website. “You have the right of way.”

The loss of the city’s former City Hall, post office, fire station and Walton County Sheriff’s Office annex for the roundabout has been hard for some residents and others with connections to Walnut Grove, according to Moncrief.

FLAG SAVED

But the demolition wasn’t a total loss.

City workers were able to save the flagpole from the site, and there are plans to use it at a new City Hall at some point in the future, when the current City Hall on Highway 81 near Park Street is replaced with a new structure.

Also set to be installed at a new City Hall — there are no immediate plans for a new structure, Moncrief stressed — are some bricks she salvaged from the demolition site.

Also saved from the old structure at the intersection of Highways 81 and 138 was a masonry plaque inscribed with the names of some of the city’s leaders from past years, Moncrief said. The plaque is now safely stored in the existing City Hall, the mayor added.