Traffic light at mall to be adjusted
CENTER TWP — The state Department of Transportation has agreed to change the timing of a traffic light on Route 8 that township officials worried was creating a dangerous intersection.
The light at the intersection of Route 8 with the northern entrance to Clearview Mall and the entrance to the property with the new Sheetz gas station and Rite Aid pharmacy will be changed soon, officials say.
After the change, the light will no longer simultaneously give a green signal to traffic exiting Sheetz and the mall. Traffic exiting each side will each get its own green phase, township engineer Ron Olsen said.
Olsen said that motorists turning left out of the mall were not accustomed to yielding to traffic coming straight through the intersection from the other side, which has lead to some close calls and some cases where vehicles have gotten stuck in the middle of the intersection.
No serious accidents have been reported there.
The timing will be similar to the light at the nearby intersection of Route 8, the mall and Summit Road.
Supervisor Chairman Ed Latuska said that township officials had expressed concerns about safety at the intersection previously, but were told that the light's sequence needed to be quick to avoid congestion of traffic.
“I said 'Look, somebody is going to get killed here and something needs to be done'” Latuska said.
The supervisors instructed Olsen to send a follow-up letter asking for the light to be changed. Last week they got the response they were hoping for.
Wooster and Associates, the developer of the property will submit a proposal to PennDOT for revised timing calculations for the light, which will be reviewed and considered, public information officer Deborah Casadei said.
The traffic pattern for vehicles exiting the mall changed in January when the right lane was changed to allow only traffic going straight and right, not turning left. That change will remain in place, Casadei said.
