A Shelby county city is taking steps to better manage its growth.
This includes taking stock of the city’s infrastructure from the bottom up.
The city of Alabaster is taking the next step in their transition to a new asset management system.
Monday night, the city of Alabaster approved a city-wide traffic signal assessment.
This includes all 35 traffic signals in Alabaster’s city limits.
The city is essentially ‘taking inventory’ of their assets that include traffic signals, paving, streetlights, signs, drainage structures, gutters, speed humps, the sewer system and more.
Fred Hawkins, City of Alabaster Director of Environmental, Engineering and Building Service says the next phase will be assessing traffic signals, with those assessments expected to begin next week.
“That puts everything on a map, on a computer system, where you can click on an intersection or signal. It’ll pop up the signal, who owns it, who maintains it, what all is in the cabinet…all the parts and pieces,” said Hawkins.
A local civil engineering firm will be doing the assessments, it’s a job the city approved with a budget of $60,000.
Once the assessment is complete, the city can determine if any signals need to be changed, updated, or replaced.
“We’re really focusing on traffic, Alabaster has grown really fast over the past few years. the traffic and roadway infrastructure has really lagged behind. Like any busy city, we really want to focus on our traffic and roadway infrastructure to make sure we’re keeping up with population growth,” said Hawkins.
Keeping up with this growth is something residents I spoke to can concur with.
One resident said the growth is natural and expected, but they are open to any change to improve traffic in the area.
“With Alabaster growing the way that it is… more people moving down this way from the Birmingham, Hoover area, it definitely could use a little improvement. Especially getting people to and from the interstate, back into the neighborhoods, to schools and things like that… kind-of ease the flow,” said Alabaster resident Kaylor Hagerla.
While it is still uncertain if there will be any change to the signals or traffic flow yet, this is all part of the cities comprehensive plan, with expansion in mind.