FM 518 Expansion West Of Highway 288

[Timnwendy]

Update: Broadway/518 is still not open all the way to 521 yet. I'll keep checking periodically.

[20thStDad]

Holy crap, I think they hired a one-eyed retarded monkey to program the traffic lights around the town center. They are WAAAYY too long and skip cycles all the time. Traffic lights in Houston don't bother me like that and there's more traffic here, so I know it must be bad.

[Timnwendy]

Holy crap, I think they hired a one-eyed retarded monkey to program the traffic lights around the town center. They are WAAAYY too long and skip cycles all the time. Traffic lights in Houston don't bother me like that and there's more traffic here, so I know it must be bad.

Well, if you think they are bad now, you should have seen them a few months ago. That was before they retimed the last eastbound light on 518 before going under the 288 underpass. It used to be on a 20 second timer, and that was just not long enough, causing the intersection of 518 and Business Center to get gridlocked all the time. That light is now on a 30 second timer now, which has improved the traffic flow alot.

I agree there is still room for improvement in the light timings.

[CoolBuddy06]

Update: Broadway/518 is still not open all the way to 521 yet. I'll keep checking periodically.

Are they ever going to open 518 (yep, 518 is what SCR residents prefer) up to 521 on this project? What's the delay. Drove up 521 today and had to go use 2234, again.

[scrres]

Are they ever going to open 518 (yep, 518 is what SCR residents prefer) up to 521 on this project? What's the delay. Drove up 521 today and had to go use 2234, again.

http://blogs.chron.c...broadway_c.html

August 10, 2009

City awaits word on Broadway connection to FM 521

Here's something some Pearland residents may not know: How far west does Broadway go?

Projects this year by the city of Pearland and the developer of Shadow Creek Ranch have widened and extended the road as four lanes all the way to Almeda/FM 521 just over the line in Fort Bend County. A connection would provide another route for west Pearland residents to get to Beltway 8 and Houston.

But before Broadway can be connected to FM 521, the Texas Department of Transportation will need to reach an agreement with Union Pacific Railroad on issues related to the railroad tracks just west of FM 521, city of Pearland Engineer Narciso Lira said.

"We've been stalled on that part of it about two or three months," he said.

For now, Broadway is open to traffic until the last driveway headed west toward FM 521. Then the road is barricaded. (By the way, I'm calling it "Broadway" instead of FM 518 because the road stops being under the jurisdiction of Texas Department of Transportation west of Texas 288, and the western portion is under the city of Pearland's authority.)

Lira said he'd let me know any developments regarding the quest to connect the two roads.

The city spent about $6 million to widen Broadway to four lanes between Kirby and Kingsley in the spring, and the Shadow Creek Ranch developer took it from there to extend the road to FM 521, Lira said.

The proposed Broadway/FM 521 connection "will provide the residents of Shadow Creek Ranch with another alternate to the beltway, which would hopefully alleviate some of the congestion occurring on Broadway and (Texas 288) and at Shadow Creek Parkway and 288," Lira said.

The proposed tie-in with Almeda has led Felicia Kyle and other city residents to call for TxDOT to widen that road south to the future Broadway intersection.

That idea was mentioned by Drew Pelter of Pearland at an April 16 TxDOT meeting to gather public opinions on a proposal to widen FM 521 to four lanes from Beltway 8 to FM 2234 (McHard).

"I believe TxDOT should improve 521 south to the newly completed expansion of Broadway/(FM) 518)," Pelter wrote in a comment that TxDOT recently published online in a summary of the meeting . "Broadway/518 is now a fully improved 4 lane with raised medians from Hwy. 288 west to 521. A lot of traffic will be utilizing this road to cut over to 521."

Lira said that that proposed project would be funded with money earmarked to eliminate at-grade railroad crossings, hence the focus on that stretch of road, which has tracks crossing at Almeda and FM 2234. Widening FM 521 south to the future Broadway intersection wouldn't be part of that project, although TxDOT's long-term plans include widening the road south to Texas 6, he said.

"It's still just a project identified on their books," Lira said.

As for the FM 521 widening from the beltway to FM 2234, the proposed timeline has construction starting in 2014. More on that project later.

[CoolBuddy06]

Thanks for the info above. What exactly does the railroad want? Broadway will end at 521 and not go over their tracks I think.

[Timnwendy]

Looks like intersection of Broadway and Almeda Rd. may finally be opened up this month. See article.

http://www.ultimatepearland.com/2010/01/broadwayfm-521-connection-coming-soon

[JLWM8609]

I've been passing by there pretty regularly these last 2 weeks and it looks like it'll be open within days or weeks. The traffic lights are up. I for one would use it, I'd like an alternative to using County Road 59 to get to Fresno from 288. There's so many dump trucks out there on that narrow, muddy 2 lane road and they don't always stay on their side of the road. The last thing I need is to be run into a ditch one morning by an inattentive trucker.

[Timnwendy]

Yesterday the last stretch of Broadway was opened up all the way to FM 521/Almeda Rd. Here is the full article of the road opening:

http://www.ultimatepearland.com/2010/02/broadwayfm-521-intersection-open

[Chamo]

Thanks for the update..... Agree with your comment there too.

[Timnwendy]

Thanks for the update..... Agree with your comment there too.

Yes, most people aren't aware of the numerous crimes occuring along Almeda Rd. I'm worried about spillover into our MPCs, now that there is a bright shiny new connection to it.

[JLWM8609]

Yesterday the last stretch of Broadway was opened up all the way to FM 521/Almeda Rd. Here is the full article of the road opening:

http://www.ultimatepearland.com/2010/02/broadwayfm-521-intersection-open

It's been open since before yesterday, I drove it on Tuesday. Regarding this intersection and crime, crime's been occurring in your neighborhood since long before this intersection opened. I'd even argue that thieves would rather use 288 than 2 lane wide Almeda given 288's lack of traffic lights, number of lanes and high speed limit. No matter how far you move from Houston proper, as long as the Houston metro area is continuing to crawl and sprawl out "eating up prairie and crapping out suburbs", everything you're running from (including crime) is going to follow you right out to the burbs. It's a fact of life.