Michiana Area Council of Governments

Those who drive through the Osceola area have a chance to weigh in on the future of its railroad crossings. Public listening sessions will be held on Tuesday, June 9 and Wednesday, June 10 from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at Moran Elementary School.

The Michiana Area Council of Governments took action Wednesday on Interurban Trolley cuts and U.S. 30 intersection changes.

The Indiana Department of Transportation is looking to install “median U-turns” at State Road 19 and Kosciusko County Road 800 West. That would likely mean vehicles crossing U.S. 30 would first have to turn right, make a U-turn and go back to the intersection.

Routes 32 and 35 would start an hour later on weekdays and end several minutes earlier. The first two trips of Route 30 would be shortened, and the first round trip of Route 50 would be discontinued. There would also be cuts to Saturday service.

More than $24 million in state funding was awarded to area road projects last year, according to the Michiana Area Council of Governments’ annual review. Meanwhile, 40 local projects equating to almost $136 million dollars in federal funding are planned over the next four years.

The Interurban Trolley could see an eight-percent service reduction in the coming months. Transit Planner Aidan McHugh told MACOG’s Transportation Technical Advisory Committee on Wednesday that a draft plan would eliminate 11 of the top 15 least cost-effective trips.

“In a lot of these locations, we’re removing traffic signals in very rural, kind of isolated locations where we have a tendency to kind of create a [speed] yo-yo effect for vehicles and especially trucks,” INDOT Deputy Commissioner Jason Kaiser told the Michiana Area Council of Governments’ Policy Board on Wednesday.

Elkhart, Kosciusko, Marshall and St. Joseph Counties had a combined 442 crashes resulting in serious injury or death last year, according to data presented during Wednesday’s meeting of the Michiana Area Council of Governments’ Transportation Technical Advisory Committee.

The St. Joseph County Council voted to delay by at least a month a vote on creating a land bank program to more quickly redevelop long-vacant lots.

Michiana Area Council of Governments Transportation Director Caitlin Stevens says projects that are included in the report could have better odds of winning federal funding.