GARDINER ¬­– The brakes appear to have been slammed on a $3 million project to widen a stretch of U.S. Highway 101 for a truck-climbing lane.

An announcement to that effect on Monday night by state Rep. Kevin Van De Wege was met with resounding applause from 100 people — many of them living at Discovery Bay Resort RV park — who almost filled the Gardiner Community Center.

Rising gasoline prices have driven down gas tax revenues, said the Sequim Democrat who represents the 24th District, and as the revenues have fallen, so have the chances that delayed projects will have a future.

“We have a very good outlook that the project isn’t going to happen,” said Van De Wege, who represents Clallam, Jefferson and a portion of Grays Harbor counties.

Cutting the $3 million intended for the Gardiner passing lanes project could benefit other high-priority projects, such as one to widen Highway 101 between Sequim and Port Angeles, he said.

That and other highway projects “are funded. They are going to remain funded,” Van De Wege said.

“It helps us a lot to cancel projects like this inside the district.

“It’s nice that we have a project that we can cut.”

The 1.4-mile-long truck-climbing lane was proposed to allow motorists to pass slow-moving vehicles.

It would have run from about a quarter-mile east of the Wild Birds Unlimited shop to the Discovery Bay Resort.

It was proposed to begin next spring and be completed by 2010. The Gardiner project was designed in 1996, said state Department of Transportation engineer David Garlington.

It was put on the shelf and taken off several times before it was scheduled, he added.

Gardiner residents worried that the lane would increase traffic danger.

Safety improvements

Kevin Dayton, Transportation’s Olympic Region administrator, told the audience that rumble bumps on the Highway 101 center line and emergency parking lanes and added guard rails have been relatively cheap and effective safety improvements in the past year.

Dayton said the engineering on some passing-lane projects such a the one in Gardiner “may not be right” and could require further engineering considerations.

One resident suggested the project be moved one mile east.

State Patrol Lt. Clint Casebolt said signage and other improvements could make the highway even safer.

“As I drive up and down the highway, I see some of the issues that you have.”

Gardiner residents raised concerns about making left turns on and off the highway into their streets or driveways, while chip and log trucks and other vehicles bore down on them or passed them on the right at high speed.

“There’s a lot of illegal passing going on around here,” Casebolt said.

Others from Gardiner complained about driving the legal speed limit with motorists following them too close en route to Sequim.

Other projects

The state’s 9.5-cent gasoline tax increase was phased in through four stages: 3 cents in July 2005 and July 2006, 2 cents in July 2007, and 1.5 cents in July 2008. Rising gasoline prices have slowed driving — and thus depressed expected revenues from the gas tax, state officials have said.

The biggest project funded in part by the gas tax increase approved in 2005 is the $470.9 million Hood Canal bridge retrofit and replacement project. The bridge’s east half is scheduled to be replaced in May-June 2009, and the retrofitting of the west half is scheduled to be completed by December 2010.

Other projects still in the works include:

âñ  A two-way passing lane project that is about two weeks from opening on 101 east of Blyn, and another climbing-lane project proposed on 101 just west of 7 Cedars Casino from Dean Creek to Dawley Road.

The latter project would be completed some time in 2009.

âñ  A $2.6 million safety project along 62 miles of state Highway 112 between Joyce and Neah Bay that was scheduled to be finished this month.

âñ  A $13.4 million vehicle holding area at the Port Townsend ferry terminal to improve ferry loading and reduce congestion on city streets.

âñ  A series of log jams estimated at $9.5 million in the Hoh River to reduce erosion threatening U.S. Highway 101 south of Forks as well as to improve fish habitat on the Hoh.

âñ  Several structures estimated at $300,000 along state Highway 112 and the Hoko and Pysht Rivers west of Port Angeles to protect the river banks and roadways from repetitive erosion.

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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com