Yonezawa East project sees the light

Wheels in motion for extension of street across SR 17

MOSES LAKE — The plan to extend Yonezawa Boulevard across Highway 17 is beginning to take its first steps, as developers and engineers are beginning to trace the future look of the area.

The reason for the project, Dan Stall, an engineer with Columbia Northwest Engineering, said, is to provide access to the land in the area around Highway 17, Yonezawa and Nelson Road, so that it can be developed. Currently most of that particular area is farmland owned by Ken Buley, Stall said.

Stall's company is working with Buley, who said he has been wanting to develop that property for 15 years.

The project is meant to extend Yonezawa to the east approximately 500 feet, across Highway 17 and into the property to the east of there. Then it would reach around and veer north until reaching Nelson Road.

Stall said that the road that extends east from Highway 17 would be called Yonezawa East and as it veers north, it might be called Moses Lake Avenue.

"Part of the agreement with the city and the Washington State Department of Transportation is to gain an access point at Highway 17 and Yonezawa," he said. "To be able to change that T-(shaped) intersection into a cross intersection."

Currently, most of the property affected by this project is farmland, surrounded by the Conservation Service and the South Campus area.

Moses Lake City Manager Joe Gavinski said the city has requested certain improvements to the proposed Yonezawa East and Moses Lake Avenue in order to make them walking-friendly, he said.

The city's preferred design to Moses Lake Avenue includes pedestrian buffers, crossings, landscaping, bike lanes and narrower traffic lanes.

"We would like to have more aesthetics being offered," Gavinski said, mentioning the proposal by development expert Dan Burden on how to make a city more walkable.

In September of this year, Burden, a developer from Florida, brought to Moses Lake his ideas on how to turn the city into a healthier, more community-based place, with an emphasis on walking instead of driving.

The required cost for this project, Gavinski said, would be paid by the city of Moses Lake from the city's capital improvement account. Although no figures were mentioned by Stall or Gavinski, the city manager said that there was enough money to fund some of these projects.