Riverton's traffic record stops in 2024, and so does its safety plan

Riverton's case for itself is that it measured before it acted. On October 23, 2025 the city's consultant on the Master Transportation Plan update, Thomas McMurtry of Avenue Consultants, took the Planning Commission through the crash data for the five years ending 2024: 3,948 crashes in Riverton, eight of them fatal, only two of those on city streets, and no bicyclist or pedestrian deaths. Serious and fatal crashes, he reported, were lower than in neighbouring cities and lower than the state average 1. The same presentation showed a city that understands what it is dealing with: 156,000 trips a day originate in Riverton and only 37 per cent of them end there, and 12600 South between Mountain View Corridor and Bangerter Highway carries about 30,000 vehicles a day 1. This is a council that bought the study before promising any concrete 1.

That reading deserves respect. The rest of the record complicates it.

The reassuring window ends in 2024, and 2024 was the worst year in it. The same five-year set that produced eight deaths produced 829 crashes in 2024 alone - its highest total, roughly 2.3 a day 1. The minutes also record how those numbers were built: collected from police reports, with crashes nobody reported left out 1. Severity figures drawn from reported crashes understate how much is happening on a street, and the city publishes no crash figure of its own anywhere a resident would look. Its traffic page lists two construction projects, neither of them the city's 10. Its traffic-calming page is one paragraph and a form 8.

Around the city the trend runs the other way. Utah recorded 59,437 crashes and 277 deaths in 2024, 47 per cent of the crashes at intersections 2. The Wasatch Front Regional Council's 2025 annual safety report, completed on August 18, 2026, counts 4,364 fatal and serious injury crashes across the region from 2021 to 2025 - 628 deaths, 3,735 serious injuries - with the annual total climbing from 861 in 2021 to 976 in 2025 and serious injuries at 856, the widest gap yet against the region's commitment to cut them 2.5 per cent a year 3. The risk factor cited most often in those crashes is the intersection 3, which the region's safety plan had already named: 49 per cent of fatalities and serious injuries in the WFRC area happen at intersections, and converting a two-way stop-controlled intersection to a roundabout has a proven reduction of up to 82 per cent in fatal and serious injury crashes 4.

A city that believes its record is good should want to keep it good. The regional council's report carries an appendix of the local safety projects completed in 2025, listed by jurisdiction. Bluffdale reports seven - roundabout island improvements, high-visibility crosswalk striping, raised crosswalks at trail crossings, added street lighting 3. South Jordan reports eleven 3. Riverton appears nowhere in the appendix. The report says its list comes from the jurisdictions that answered its survey 3, so the record is consistent either with a city that completed no reportable safety project in 2025 or with one that did not reply. Either reading sets the same test for a plan still being written.

And the plan is the decision that matters here. Riverton's Master Transportation Plan was not driven by the crash list. The City Engineer told the commission on October 23 that 12600 South from Bangerter Highway to Mountain View Corridor is a city road that will be transferred to UDOT, that UDOT intends to widen it to seven lanes within ten years and to nine by 2050 5, and that the city's concerns about that expansion were a driver of the update 1. When the council set the plan's goals in July 2025, the five it chose put keeping vehicles moving first and multimodal safety and connectivity fourth 1.

The schedule has slipped twice. The city's own project page promised data collection and a public survey in October and November 2025, a capital improvement plan developed in fall 2025, and a draft plan presented in April 2026 16. Read on October 14, 2026, the page still describes the work as being in its final engagement stage, with its last input step - the online comment map - closed on June 17, 2026, and its capital improvement plan still listed for summer 2026 6. On Thursday, October 22, the Planning Commission holds a public hearing on PLZ-26-5009, changes to the Transportation Plan Element of the city's General Plan 7. The policy goes to hearing before the ranked, costed project list has ever been published.

Our judgement is about sequence, and the decision is the City Council's. In July 2025 the council placed keeping vehicles moving above multimodal safety in the goal list that governs its own plan 1. On October 22 its Planning Commission will take the Transportation Plan Element of the General Plan to a hearing on a traffic-safety record whose data ends in 2024 and rests only on reported crashes 167. The consequence is that Riverton adopts the policy half of its transportation plan before anyone outside City Hall can weigh the evidence half. The city has funded the expensive part. What is missing is the page that shows the work, and its own new plan is being adopted without it.

Five things would change our mind, and none needs a new argument. Publish the city-level crash data behind the plan - locations, severity, the years used and the rate basis for the comparison with other cities - refreshed through 2025 and 2026 from the state's free public crash portal 19. Publish the capital improvement plan and the ranked, costed project list before the Transportation Plan Element is adopted, not after 67. Put the traffic-calming criteria, the thresholds and the request queue on the website, on the schedule staff gave the council on August 4 11. Respond to the regional council's next survey, so its 2026 accounting of safety work in this valley contains Riverton 3. And say what a seven-lane 12600 South is expected to do to the intersection record that is already the region's most-cited risk factor, and how that squares with the region's own enhanced-bus vision for the same corridor 412. Regional traffic is Riverton's traffic; this paper's own collision coverage this autumn recorded a rollover on Mountain View Corridor at 13400 South, on a road the city does not own 13. The city cannot control every crash on its map. It can publish the ones it has.

Sources:

1 Riverton City, Planning Commission meeting minutes, October 23, 2025: the Master Transportation Plan update progress review by Thomas McMurtry of Avenue Consultants; the five-year crash data ending 2024 totalling 3,948 crashes with 2024 the highest at 829; serious and fatal crashes lower than neighbouring cities and the state average, with eight fatal crashes over five years and two on city streets and no bicyclist or pedestrian deaths; the note that data was collected from police reports so non-reported crashes were not included; 156,000 daily trips originating in Riverton in 2024 with 37 per cent staying in the city; the City Council's five goals for the plan set in July 2025; 12600 South between Mountain View Corridor and Bangerter Highway averaging 30,000 vehicles a day; and the City Engineer's statement that UDOT intends to widen 12600 South to seven lanes within 10 years and potentially nine, and that the City's concerns about that expansion were a driver of the plan update; and the schedule listing a draft plan for April 2026. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1350519.pdf

2 Utah Department of Public Safety, Highway Safety Office, Utah Crash Facts 2024 (completed August 2025): 59,437 crashes, 27,094 injuries, 277 fatalities in 2024; 47 per cent of crashes occurred at an intersection. https://highwaysafety.utah.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024-Crash-Fact-Sheet-5-1.pdf

3 Wasatch Front Regional Council, Comprehensive Safety Action Plan 2025 Annual Report (completed August 18, 2026): 4,364 fatal and serious injury crashes in the WFRC region from 2021 to 2025, resulting in 628 fatalities and 3,735 serious injuries; the annual combined total rising from 861 in 2021 to 976 in 2025; serious injuries of 856 in 2025 exceeding the target by the largest margin of the period; the top-five most frequently cited risk factors for serious and fatal crashes led by intersection; the statement that the appendix list of local safety projects completed in 2025 comes from local jurisdictions responding to the survey; and Appendix A.1, which lists seven Bluffdale projects and eleven South Jordan projects among 52 entries and does not list Riverton. https://wfrc.utah.gov/RegionalPlans/CSAP/2026/Annual%20Safety%20Report%202025.pdf

4 Wasatch Front Regional Council, Comprehensive Safety Action Plan (adopted April 25, 2024): 49 per cent of fatalities and serious injuries in the WFRC area occurred at intersections; converting a two-way stop-controlled intersection to a roundabout has a proven reduction of up to 82 per cent of fatal and serious injury crashes; Table 7-10, Case Study Project Locations for the South Salt Lake Valley geographic focus area, lists 13400 South from 6400 West to Bangerter Highway for the jurisdictions of Herriman and Riverton (projects 10.54.1.1 and 10.55.1.1), and lists Sentinel Ridge Boulevard from 14230 South to 13400 South for Herriman (10.54.3). https://wfrc.utah.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/WFRC-CSAP-Final-Report_04-29-2024.pdf

5 Riverton City, Planning Commission meeting minutes, May 8, 2025: the City Engineer's statement that UDOT intends to widen 12600 South to seven lanes and anticipates a future widening to nine lanes by 2050, and that City Staff met UDOT that day to discuss 12600 South and its future transfer to the State. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1269313.pdf

6 Riverton City, 2025 Transportation Master Plan and Active Transportation Plan project page, May 2026 update, read October 14, 2026: the plans are in the final engagement stage and will be guided by a data-driven approach using vehicle speeds, crash history and travel patterns; the schedule listing data collection and public survey in October and November 2025, a capital improvement plan developed in fall 2025 and finalized in summer 2026; and the online comment map accepting input through June 17, 2026. https://www.rivertonutah.gov/publicworks/2025_active_transportation_plan.php

7 Riverton City public notice, Planning Commission public hearing, October 22, 2026: item d, Master Transportation Plan, PLZ-26-5009, proposed changes to the Transportation Plan Element of the City's General Plan. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1499041.pdf

8 Riverton City, Traffic Assessment Request: the city's public traffic-calming process is a form to be completed and returned to the Public Works Department. https://www.rivertonutah.gov/publicworks/traffic-assessment.php

9 Utah Department of Public Safety, Highway Safety Office, Crash Data and Statistics: the Utah Crash Data Portal, which provides crash data from 2010 to the most recent data loaded, including location summaries by city. https://highwaysafety.utah.gov/crash-data-and-statistics/

10 Riverton City, Traffic: the ongoing projects listed are the Jordan Basin Improvement District sewer upgrade on 13400 South and the Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District pipeline on 3200 West. https://www.rivertonutah.gov/traffic/

11 Riverton City, City Council meeting minutes, August 4, 2026: the City Engineer's traffic calming presentation, the criteria of crash history, measured speeds and pedestrian proximity, and the staff undertakings to establish timelines for each phase, provide a publicly accessible explanation of the process and distribute regular updates on the status of traffic requests. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1483161.pdf

12 Wasatch Front Regional Council, 12600 South Corridor Profile, Transit Fresh Look, January 13, 2026: the corridor's vision mode is enhanced bus, with approximately 1,500 acres of planning exploration areas within a half mile. https://wfrc.utah.gov/RegionalPlans/TransitFreshLook/12600%20South_Corridor%20Profile_1.13.2026.pdf

13 South Valley Ledger, Rollover crash closed a lane on Mountain View Corridor in Riverton, September 26, 2026: a rollover in the northbound lanes near 13400 South, reported by FOX 13 News from UDOT's traffic account. https://southvalleyledger.com/articles/rollover-crash-closed-a-lane-on-mountain-view-corridor-in-riverton-e7c358/