Neighbors have expressed skepticism about a proposed roundabout at Kenwood Boulevard and Secor Road and the city of Toledo offered an alternative option as part of a $5 million redesign of Secor between Kenwood and Central Avenue in West Toledo.
“My position is, do nothing. Period. ... It is just not needed. It works well” as is, Dan Strohmeier, a neighbor, said in an interview during a meeting Tuesday at Old Orchard Elementary School.
More than 120 people attended the meeting hosted by the Toledo Department of Transportation and City Councilman Sam Melden, whose district encompasses Westgate and Old Orchard and includes Secor.
A few other attendees said they’d rather choose the newly-proposed alternative — a three-lane roadway, with a U-turn and center lane as a turn lane — to the roundabout.
“I am against the roundabout a hundred percent,” Dawn Dennis, another neighbor, said. “There should be a turn lane, with a U-turn. ... I think it is more pedestrian friendly. There’s a lot of pedestrians, families, joggers all day long. How are they going to cross when there’s a roundabout?”
Gary Holewinski, also a neighbor, said he is “not in favor of either option.”
“[But] if those are my only two [options], I will take the U-turn, because the roundabout as projected is very unfriendly to pedestrians,” Mr. Holewinski said.
Physically blocking most left turns and all cross traffic with a median divider while providing wider lanes is how Toledo officials propose to reduce crashes on the trouble-prone stretch of Secor.
The original proposal — which called, in part, for a new roundabout at Secor and Kenwood, replacing a traffic light there — was met with criticism by neighbors who voiced right-of-way and traffic safety concerns when city officials unveiled the proposal during a public presentation May 9 at the Toledo Lucas County Public Library’s Sanger Branch.
On Tuesday, participants were given a survey asking them to grade the two alternatives and a few pedestrian solutions. The event also featured manned stands outlining details of the two major options.
Unlike the May 9 meeting, when neighbors took turns taking the floor to ask questions and express their concerns, this time they were asked to approach Councilman Melden and ask their questions privately. A few then shared their opinions with reporters.
At the outset of the event, Mr. Melden, who served as the moderator, presented the two main project options and emphasized the funding was mostly “external.”
Of the $5,022,400 project cost, $4,017,920 is budgeted from a federal grant, $488,130 from a state grant, and $516,350 from the city’s capital improvement funds, according to a city handout.
Another key element to the project is physically blocking left turns out of the Westgate Village Shopping Center’s two driveways on Secor. Both driveways now have signs and pavement markings designating them for right turns only, but motorists frequently disregard those restrictions.
Toledo police logged at least a dozen crashes at the northerly driveway, across from Markway Road, between January, 2023, and May, 2024, involving drivers making left turns or driving straight across to Markway and colliding with other vehicles.
Secor’s new median between Central and Kenwood would have breaks for northbound traffic to make either a U-turn just north of Westgate’s southerly entrance or a left turn into the northerly entrance. But its curbing would be designed to block anyone trying to turn left or go straight across to Markway from the northerly entrance.
Markway would become right-in, right-out on the northbound side of Secor, forcing westbound traffic on Markway to turn toward Central. Anyone wishing to go south on Secor or into Westgate from that neighborhood would need to approach Secor from Hughes Drive and then turn through the median.
The median also would block all left turns to and from four side streets west of Secor and Hughes and Christie Street to its east. Motorists wishing to reach eastbound Hughes and Christie from southbound Secor would need to continue to the roundabout at Kenwood if they did not opt to enter the neighborhood from Central.
Drivers on northbound Secor would have to use the new U-turn lane between Hughes and Markway or they could go west on Kenwood and enter the neighborhood via Manchester Boulevard, according to Doug Stephens, acting director of public utilities and former transportation director.
Secor currently has four lanes 9 feet wide over all except the northernmost few hundred feet of the project area, which results in sideswipe collisions along with angle and rear-end crashes arising from left turns.
The project calls for the left lane to become 10 feet wide and the right lane a standard 12 feet, with the wider right lane providing more wiggle room before vehicles hit the curb, according to city staff.
A 10-foot median, pavement widening of 6 feet, and a multiuse path along Secor’s west side all can be done within the existing Secor right-of-way, with some partial, triangular land takes needed to build the roundabout at Kenwood, officials said.
The proposed Kenwood roundabout would have two lanes for north-south movement on Secor but only one lane on each east-west arc for Kenwood. Motorists planning to turn from Secor onto Kenwood will need to be in the proper lane for left or right as they approach.
Councilman Melden said Tuesday he would like to have public feedback processed sometime by Labor Day “to know where we are headed,” citing an approaching project design deadline.
“I want to have a sense of where this is going by the end of the summer,” he said.
The section of Secor in the current project was part of a broader plan proposed in 2017 that would have rebuilt and, south of Hughes Drive, widened Secor all the way to Brantford Road. That project was thwarted by opposition from the village of Ottawa Hills, whose border with Toledo runs down the middle of Secor south of Kenwood.
Construction is scheduled for 2026.
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