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Construction for New Las Vegas Triple A Ballpark Moving Along, But Crossing Road to Reach Venue Could Be Dangerous

A pedestrian sign points to the crosswalk but motorists still speed across the crosswalk through the roundabout at the new ballpark.

By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com

 

It’s well documented via Metro Police crackdowns that some motorists in Las Vegas do not feel it’s necessary to stop for pedestrians in crosswalks.

 

Well, a local Las Vegas crosswalk that is expected to be a quite busy in four months could use some extra attention.

 

The new Las Vegas Ballpark, a $150 million top-shelf minor league baseball venue in Summerlin in Clark County, is scheduled to open April 9.

 

I stroll by the ball yard construction site every day during morning walks, reaching the ballpark from the Downtown Summerlin shopping center parking lot via a crosswalk that crosses a roundabout on Pavilion Center Drive.

A walker using the crosswalk Wednesday.

 

This crosswalk, the roundabout and Pavilion Center Drive all need some serious traffic calming and motorist alert signs quickly because I have personally experienced southbound Pavilion Center Drive motorists barrelling into the roundabout at the ballpark and not yielding to me in the crosswalk. Northbound motorists also drive too fast into the roundabout and can threaten the safety of peds walking in the crosswalk.

 

ADDITION TO STORY AFTER CONTACTING HOWARD HUGHES CORPORATION: From Howard Hughes PR Rep Melissa Warren:

 

“Flashers will be installed at crosswalks near the roundabouts.  The contractor will be announced next week.

“There is also a plan to have crossing guards on all game days/nights.”

 

One southbound Pavilion Center Drive motorist did stop, screeching his car to a halt at the crosswalk and poking his head through the driver window to scream at me for having the audacity to be crossing the roundabout in the crosswalk.

 

Dangerous motorist behavior is nothing new in Las Vegas. There are drunk, impaired, distracted, incompetent and impatient motorists operating their vehicles on metro roads all the time.

 

But the potential for tragedy is there when you mix speeding motorists with pedestrians trying to cross a busier Pavilion Center Drive — a key Summerlin north-south, four-land road offering access to Downtown Summerlin, the Golden Knights training center and now the Las Vegas Aviators’ new ballpark in four months.

 

LVSportsBiz.com is concerned about the pedestrian safety issues about the roundabout crosswalk to reach the ball yard and wrote the following letter to Howard Hughes Corporation, team, Clark County and Hunt-Penta (construction manager) representatives. Howard Hughes Corp., Summerlin’s master developer, is building the $150 million, 10,000-fan, 22-suite ball yard, with the LVCVA public tourism agency giving Howard Hughes $80 million for a “naming rights” sponsorship deal. Here’s the letter sent Wednesday:

Hi folks. Every day I walk by the ballpark construction site on South Pavilion Center Drive and the venue looks like it’s coming along. In fact, I publish many photos of the ballpark construction from my daily walks on my LVSportsBiz.com social media.

But I am writing today to bring to your attention what I perceive is a dangerous situation and setting for pedestrians at the ballpark site.
When I walk in a crosswalk through the roundabout at the ballpark to get from the shopping center side of Pavilion Center Drive to the ballpark side, I have experienced southbound motorists speeding into the roundabout and not yielding to me in the crosswalk. This is a very dangerous situation. There are only four months until the ballpark opens and education for motorists to slow down along that stretch of Pavilion Center Drive should have already started.
My questions for Howard Hughes Corporation and Clark County are:
— will there be a pedestrian activated LED light system to warn motorists of crossing pedestrians at that crosswalk at the ballpark?
— will there be stronger enforcement of the current 30 mph speed limit along Pavilion Center Drive at that location?
— will there be traffic calming strategies implemented to slow down the motorists entering and leaving the roundabout at the ballpark?
— will there be a public awareness program started to keep motorists from crashing into pedestrians using that crosswalk and other crossings along Pavilion Center Drive at and near the ballpark?
I have lived in major metropolitan areas across the country and sadly and regrettably I have witnessed road design that caters to the car-centric, convenience-for-the-motorist priority over pedestrian and bicyclist safety. As you know, there’s more residential and hotel development along and near the Pavilion Center Drive corridor and I expect the number of pedestrians to only increase in numbers with or without a ballpark.
Based on my own personal experiences of walking through that roundabout crosswalk at the ballpark, I fear there is a tragedy waiting to happen based on my own eyewitness observations of how motorists drive their cars into and through the roundabout during my walks at the ballpark.
Please let me know what steps — if any — you plan to take to slow down motorists on Pavilion Center Drive and to avoid any tragedies in that roundabout crosswalk at the ballpark.
I am writing a column for my news site LVSportsBiz.com on this subject today and look forward to your responses.
All the best,
Alan Snel

 

LVSportsBiz.com will publish any responses and will keep you posted on any Pavilion Center pedestrian improvements at the ballpark.

 

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In other local sports facility news, the Raiders will hold a groundbreaking for its new $100 million headquarters in Henderson on Jan. 14.

 

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Follow LVSportsBiz.com on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Contact LVSportsBiz.com founder/writer Alan Snel at asnel@LVSportsBiz.com if you would like to buy his new book, Long Road Back to Las Vegas.

Alan Snel: Alan Snel brings decades of sports-business reporting experience to LVSportsBiz.com. Snel covered the business side of sports for the South Florida (Fort Lauderdale) Sun-Sentinel, the Tampa Tribune and Las Vegas Review-Journal. As a city hall beat reporter, Snel also covered stadium deals in Denver and Seattle. In 2000, Snel launched a sport-business website for FoxSports.com called FoxSportsBiz.com. After reporting sports-business for the RJ, Snel wrote hard-hitting stories on the Raiders stadium for the Desert Companion magazine in Las Vegas and The Nevada Independent. Snel is also one of the top bicycle advocates in the country.
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