Traffic in South Jordan: what the record shows

South Jordan did the work most cities skip. In August 2024 the City Council adopted a Transportation Master Plan prepared by Wall Consulting Group, and its safety analysis used five full years of UDOT crash data, from January 1, 2018 to December 31, 2022 1. Of 5,222 reported crashes, 98 involved suspected serious injuries and eight were fatal 1. The city’s rate of fatal and serious injury crashes — 1.87 per cent of all crashes — sat below the Salt Lake County average of 1.93 per cent 1. The city publishes the criteria its Traffic Committee applies to a crossing request — pedestrian volumes, pedestrian age, land use, traffic speeds, crash history and geometry — and it has six HAWK pedestrian signals, three on South Jordan Parkway 2. Streets are paid for from the Class C road fund and a local transit tax rather than borrowing, with $6,361,000 for transportation projects in the current capital plan 3. The city also states what is not its to fix: UDOT owns Bangerter Highway, Mountain View Corridor, I-15, U-111 and “major corridors like South Jordan & Daybreak Parkways” 4. On Bangerter the partnership delivered — all three city interchanges, built as underpasses, on a highway now stoplight-free from I-15 5.

Set against that is a sentence in the plan’s own safety chapter that has not been repeated since: “Crashes have been steadily decreasing in South Jordan City since 2018. Fatal and serious injury crashes have been steadily increasing.” 1 Sixteen of the 98 severe crashes involved a pedestrian or a bicyclist — 26 per cent of all severe crashes on city roadways 1. For those, three remedies. At 11800 South and Trail Crossing Drive, where two severe pedestrian crashes have occurred since 2018, the recommendation is “yield to pedestrian” signage and protected-only left-turn phasing 1. At the Daybreak Parkway and Oquirrh Lake Road roundabout, with two severe bicycle crashes, it recommends the city “continue to monitor this intersection” 1. A third location gets restriped 1. Those are the plan’s answers for the three places its own analysis flagged.

Most of the rest is capacity, and much of it is not the city’s to build. The plan records that UDOT “initially planned for a 5-lane cross section” on SR-111 between 11800 South and 12600 South but “has recently scaled this back to 2-lanes for initial construction due to budget limitations,” leaving that section congested even after the plan’s projects, the five-lane fix deferred to a 2050 scenario 1.

Mountain View Corridor is where the paperwork stops. In October 2024 residents pressed for a pedestrian and bicycle bridge over it, and FOX 13 News reported figures the city supplied: over 14 years, 88 per cent of pedestrian and cyclist crashes on the corridor in South Jordan came from conflicts with right-turning vehicles, with eight such crashes at four intersections, three of them at 11800 South 6. A petition with more than 500 signatures reached the council as public comment on December 3, 2024, asking the city to work with UDOT on a safe crossing near the stadium 7. The city’s answer, in its own words, is that it is “constantly monitoring hazards and areas of concern,” and that grade-separated crossings are being planned with UDOT, whose construction there is set for 2027 6. Its own February survey found traffic flow the most important aspect of life in the city, named by 28 per cent against 18 per cent for quality of life 8.

Our judgement is about sequence, not sincerity. The council made a good decision on August 6, 2024, adopting this plan as Resolution 2024-31: it bought a diagnosis and a map 1. It has funded the map and left the diagnosis. We could find nothing in the public record showing that either location — 11800 South and Trail Crossing Drive, or the Oquirrh Lake roundabout — was rebuilt since, and nothing published since the plan updates the city’s crash counts past 2022 — so the two facts that would settle the matter, whether those corners changed and whether the crashes stopped, are not on the record 1. The city is right that Mountain View Corridor is UDOT’s road; that explains a timeline, it does not answer the request residents made nearly two years ago 67. The U-111 work is the pattern in miniature: a new state signal at 11800 South, city tie-ins at Lake Avenue and Docksider Drive, a corridor unfinished until late 2027 910. This page made the same argument about Riverton last week 11.

Four things would change our mind; none needs new money first. Publish a crash analysis newer than the 2018–2022 window, with counts by location, and repeat it annually instead of once per plan. Say what happened to the three recommendations, and if signage was judged sufficient at 11800 South and Trail Crossing Drive, publish the reasoning and the crash count there since 1. Put the Traffic Committee’s queue online: the city publishes the criteria but not the requests, the decisions or the dates. And state what share of the Phase 1 project list is funded this decade. South Jordan has the better analysis. It has not shown that the analysis changes a corner.

Sources:

1 South Jordan City, City Council meeting of August 6, 2024 — staff report, Resolution 2024-31 and the Transportation Master Plan (Wall Consulting Group, July 2024): the UDOT-based crash analysis for January 2018 to December 2022, 5,222 crashes with 98 suspected serious injuries and eight fatalities, the 1.87 per cent severe crash rate against the county average, the 2018 to 2023 trend language, 16 severe crashes involving a pedestrian or bicyclist, the three safety recommendations, the 2033 no-build level-of-service findings, the SR-111 five-lane to two-lane scale-back, and the Phase 1 project list. https://mccmeetingspublic.blob.core.usgovcloudapi.net/sojordanut-meet-3d5fa873a8104a6cb9acff09e486c5ef/ITEM-Attachment-001-ffb6661977dc4049a3925d3bc93dd159.pdf

2 City of South Jordan, “Back to School Safety” — the six HAWK pedestrian signals (three on South Jordan Parkway, two on 4000 West, one on Jordan Gateway) and the Traffic Committee’s criteria for evaluating a resident request for pedestrian safety improvements. https://www.sjc.utah.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=299

3 City of South Jordan, Annual Budget, Fiscal Year 2026-2027 — Class C Road Fund and Local Transit Tax revenue and $6,361,000 for transportation projects in the capital funding summary. https://www.sjc.utah.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/723

4 City of South Jordan, “What Your City Taxes Pay For…and What They Don’t,” November 25, 2025 — the city maintains neighborhood roadways and “manages traffic calming”; UDOT is responsible for Bangerter Highway, Mountain View Corridor, I-15, U-111 and “major corridors like South Jordan & Daybreak Parkways.” https://www.sjc.utah.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=408

5 City of South Jordan, “South Jordan Celebrates Completion of Bangerter Highway Interchanges” — all three city interchanges complete and built as underpasses, with Bangerter Highway stoplight-free from I-15 in Draper to 4100 South in Taylorsville. https://www.sjc.utah.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=407

6 FOX 13 News, “South Jordan residents call for pedestrian bridge over busy highway,” October 19, 2024 — the rally and petition, the City of South Jordan’s statement, and the city-supplied table recording that 88 per cent of pedestrian and cyclist crashes on Mountain View Corridor in South Jordan involved right-turning vehicles, with eight at four intersections including three at 11800 South; UDOT construction set for 2027. https://www.fox13now.com/news/driven-to-change/south-jordan-residents-are-calling-for-a-pedestrian-bridge

7 South Jordan City Council minutes, December 3, 2024 — public comment presenting a petition asking the city to work with UDOT and the Larry H. Miller companies for a safe crossing over Mountain View Corridor near the stadium. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1217319.pdf

8 South Jordan Citizen Survey, City Council study meeting, February 17, 2026 — traffic flow ranked the most important aspect of life in South Jordan at 28 per cent, ahead of quality of life at 18 per cent. https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1416391.pdf

9 Utah Department of Transportation, “U-111 | South Jordan Parkway to Herriman Boulevard” — the new traffic signal at 11800 South, South Jordan’s tie-in work at Lake Avenue and Docksider Drive, and full opening expected in late fall 2027. https://udotinput.utah.gov/u111extension

10 City of South Jordan, Construction Projects — the U-111 South Jordan Parkway to Herriman Boulevard extension listing. https://www.sjc.utah.gov/288/Construction-Projects

11 South Valley Ledger, “Traffic in Riverton: what the record shows,” October 2026 — this page’s earlier argument on the same theme. https://southvalleyledger.com/articles/traffic-in-riverton-what-the-record-shows-f86308/