PROPOSED CHANGES TO HIGHWAY 290 CROSSOVERS DETAILED AT TOWN HALL MEETING

  

Dozens of community members and local officials attended a TxDOT town hall on Thursday to learn more about plans to redesign various crossovers along Highway 290, between Blue Bell Road in Brenham and FM 2447 in Chappell Hill. 

TxDOT is seeking to improve safety and traffic flow along the Highway 290 corridor by reconfiguring some existing crossovers to Restricted Crossing U-Turn (R-CUT) intersections and closing other crossovers, with no additional right-of-way acquisition proposed.  Thursday’s come-and-go event, held at the Chappell Hill Volunteer Fire Department Community Hall, displayed exhibits showing crash data on the highway and videos illustrating how the R-CUT’s design works.

Sydney Fox, Public Engagement Specialist for TxDOT’s Bryan District, said the R-CUTs are meant to decrease the number of points where vehicles can collide, with the intent of lowering the risk for higher-severity crashes.

According to information posted at the meeting, this 4.7-mile stretch of Highway 290, from half a mile east of FM 577 to 0.2 miles west of FM 2447, saw 300 total crashes between 2015 and 2023.  Nearly half of those crashes came close to an intersection, with a TxDOT heat map showing the most crashes occurred at intersections like Wonder Hill Road, William B. Travis Lane, Bluebonnet Boulevard and FM 2447 / Bueno Drive.  

TxDOT’s figures for average daily traffic in 2024 show the corridor experienced 30,000 vehicles per day, with traffic volumes expected to increase 77 percent by 2044.

TxDOT has previously explored implementing the R-CUT concept at the intersection of Highway 290 and FM 1155 in Chappell Hill, but strong pushback from the community led to that plan being put on the backburner.  Fox said the feedback TxDOT receives from the public is incorporated in all of its projects, and the agency reflects on what it has learned from previous endeavors.

As for when this project could get underway, Fox said construction could start by the end of the year, though a slide displayed at the meeting showed construction could potentially begin as early as late summer. 

Public comments on the project can continue to be submitted through Friday, February 14^th by mail or email to the TxDOT – Bryan District Office.  Comments can be sent by email to BRY_PublicComment@txdot.gov or by mail to the TxDOT – Bryan District Office, 2591 North Earl Rudder Freeway, Attn: Sydney Fox.

TxDOT’s full project page can be viewed here. 

Click here to see the exhibit boards shown at Thursday’s town hall meeting.