Extension to ease Walnut Grove jam

The chronically congested intersection of Walnut Grove and Farm roads is about to undergo another improvement project — this one done by Shelby County.

Just days after the city of Memphis extended a left-turn lane and an acceleration lane on Walnut Grove Road at the intersection, county officials have authorized a project that will lengthen the right-turn lane from Farm Road onto Walnut Grove Road. Currently long enough for only a few cars, the lane will be lengthened to about 300 feet, said County Public Works Director Tom Needham.

“Our goal is to have it completed before the asphalt plants close” for the winter, which occurs in early December, he added.

The intersection in the middle of Shelby Farms is the scene of daily traffic jams as commuters from the north-south Farm Road converge with east-west traffic on Walnut Grove Road. The city’s project was intended to provide space for more eastbound vehicles turning left from Walnut Grove during the evening rush hour, reducing the number of cars backed up into through traffic. It also aimed to make it easier for commuters to access westbound Walnut Grove during the morning peak period.

The county’s project will build on those improvements, Needham said. Currently, most of the southbound vehicles on Farm Road turn right, or west, onto Walnut Grove in the morning. But with no adequate turn lane, they get backed up farther than necessary by the few cars turning left, he said.

“I think it’ll help get traffic moving out of Farm Road,” Needham said of the turn-lane project.

Traffic through Shelby Farms has increased nearly 19 percent since 2013, when the work began on a $109.3 million revamp of the Interstate 40-240 interchange in East Memphis. Last year, an average of more than 47,000 vehicles daily traveled on Walnut Grove east of Farm Road.

Local officials say the modest improvements at Walnut Grove and Farm roads are considered short-term fixes that could alleviate the congestion until a longer-term project — the proposed $35.9 million Shelby Farms Parkway — is built during the next decade.

Groups that include the Sierra Club, however, oppose the parkway project. Dennis Lynch, transportation chairman for the group’s Tennessee chapter, said improvements such as the county’s extension of the turn lane will help offset the need for the parkway.

“It’s a part of a set of recommendations we made four years ago,” Lynch said.