Installing a temporary traffic light lowered the number of crashes piling up at a thoroughfare near Rathdrum last year, and a permanent signal is earmarked down the road.

The intersection at Ramsey Road and Highway 53 is just one of many hotspots monitored by the Idaho Transportation Department, which knows that wrecks often result from a burgeoning population and outdated infrastructure.

Last year, the state road department logged 2,291 crashes and 18 fatalities in Kootenai County, and it has targeted five intersections as most in need of attention.

“This is a routine process for us at this time of year,” said Megan Sausser, transportation department spokesman.

At the Ramsey and Highway 53 intersection between 2014 and 2018, 25 crashes resulted in one death and 23 injuries. The fatality stemmed from a July 2018 crash.

Once high crash areas are recognized and officials know what needs to be done to increase safety, dollars make it happen.

“If a project successfully competes for funding, it will enter the program and be constructed,” Sausser said.

The “program” is a list of projects statewide that need money to improve traffic flow, or to build infrastructure that can lower the number of crashes. Once a project is chosen to be funded, it enters the “program.”

The Highway 53 and Ramsey Road intersection made the list a couple years ago, got a temporary light last year and is slated for a permanent light in 2022.

The region’s top grinder — the place where most wrecks happen in Kootenai County and, which lands at No. 6 in the state as far as vehicles crashes at intersections — requires more finesse to fix.

In 2018, the intersection of U.S. 95 and Appleway — a place where 12 lanes of traffic meet under a listless chain of traffic lights — saw 34 crashes resulting in 17 injuries.

More than 51,500 cars and trucks and motorcycles daily pass through the intersection that lies on the north side of the I-90 overpass.

Other future projects may include the intersection of Appleway Avenue and Government Way, which saw 20 crashes and seven injuries in 2018, and Prairie Avenue and Ramsey Road, where eight injuries occurred in 18 crashes that year.

Two additional sites that made the department’s top five include the Northwest Boulevard area of I-90 (milepost 11), which saw 17 crashes in 2018 that resulted in six injuries. More than 60,000 vehicles daily travel the route on I-90 between Highway 41 and Northwest Boulevard, according to the department.

Most of those vehicles are headed between Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls, Sausser said. Traffic slackens on either side of the congestion zone.

“Traffic east of Fourth Street drops to approximately 37,000 vehicles per day, which is about the same as through traffic on U.S. 95 in town,” Sausser said.

Another local, top-five crash site includes U.S. 95 and Ironwood Drive where 17 crashes in 2018 resulted in 13 injuries, according to the department.

Despite being among the state’s top traveled intersections, no money has been earmarked to upgrade the Appleway and U.S. 95 intersection, and no plans have been drawn for an improvement.

Sausser could not say what an improvement at the site would entail.

“We don’t know,” Sausser said.

But because the on and off ramps of I-90 are slated for improvement in the near future, any change at Appleway and U.S. 95 would likely be tied to an I-90 project.

“As traffic volume increases, it will get to the point where it’s not functioning,” she said.

When that happens the intersection gets an F grade, which according to models could happen by 2027, she said. By then, approximately 80,000 cars are expected daily at the U.S. 95 and Appleway intersection.

“That’s relatively soon,” Sausser said.

Top 5 crash intersections

1. U.S. 95 and Appleway Avenue

2. Appleway Avenue and Government Way

3. Prairie Avenue and Ramsey Road

4. Northwest Boulevard and I-90

5. U.S. 95 and Ironwood Drive

Editor’s note: This article has been updated for clarity.