During a Monday, June 16, Battle Ground City Council meeting, state and local officials presented updates on future improvements to the state Route 503 corridor, including the city’s ongoing effort to lower the highway’s 55 mph speed limit within city limits.
The presentation, led by Public Works Director Mark Herceg and representatives from the Washington state Department of Transportation (WSDOT), outlined planned projects that would reshape the corridor and, eventually, allow for a formal reduction in speed.
In May, the council passed Ordinance No. 2025-04, setting a target speed limit of 40 mph for state Route 503. However, implementation of the change rests with WSDOT, which requires contextual roadway changes before approving any speed reductions. Carley Francis, WSDOT’s southwest region administrator, expects that two new roundabouts in development at the intersections of Rasmussen Boulevard and Onsdorff Boulevard will allow for traffic to slow significantly.
“It’s not immediate, but (we) wanted to forecast that expectation,” Francis told the city council. “Those two (roundabouts) will really help us analyze and expect to be able to reset speeds.”
The future layout of state Route 503 would include two travel lanes in each direction, with 11-foot widths, 6-foot shoulders and an 8-foot planted median dividing northbound and southbound traffic. This design is intended to reduce speeds and improve safety by changing the look and feel of the corridor.
Herceg added that narrowing the travel lanes is a key part of the long-term plan.
“Smaller lanes, 11 feet, make drivers less comfortable, which slows down speeds,” he said. “These are the kind of projects we’ll want to see in order to ultimately meet council’s intent with the 40 mile per hour ordinance.”
Currently, the intersection at Rasmussen and state Route 503 is moving toward construction. According to Herceg, a 90% complete plan was sent to WSDOT. The city is preparing to begin design work on the Onsdorff Boulevard roundabout in North Battle Ground, an intersection that Herceg noted “has been in concurrency failure for several years.”
As part of the corridor redesign, Herceg said shared-use paths are also planned. In the central section of 503, roughly from Eaton to Main Street, a shared path would be placed on the east side of the road, with bicycle and pedestrian facilities on the west. Outside the core area, existing barriers would be removed and replaced with planted medians. A multi-use pathway currently located on the south side would be extended northward as part of the long-term plan.
A draft outlook of state Route 503 showed speeds lowered from 55 mph to 45 mph between the Rasmussen Boulevard and Onsdorff Boulevard intersections.
Councilor Shane Bowman expressed doubt about how long the full corridor change would take.
“I see this as — in my time on this council and probably in my time in this city — (that) I will not see 40 miles an hour on 503,” Bowman said.
He also criticized the funding structure for requiring the city to shoulder the cost of fixes on what he views as primarily a state and county corridor.
“Why does the city of Battle Ground have to be on the line for 100% of something that is probably 60 to 70% a state issue and a county issue?” he said. “Those are cars going through here. Those are not cars staying in our city.”
Francis acknowledged the frustration and pointed to state-level limitations.
“Improvement funds for projects on state facilities are largely designated by legislature, and WSDOT does not have discretion to direct those funds — really almost at all,” she said. “There is just the lack of preservation and maintenance funding that we’re facing — everybody’s facing that.”
“If speed limits can’t be lowered, then give us alternatives,” he said. “To help slow this stuff down ... the speeding, the running the red lights.”
He also suggested renewed collaboration with WSDOT could benefit the city’s legislative efforts.
“I think it would be beneficial to have a sign-off from you guys saying, ‘We understand you’re not giving us money to fix this,’” Bowman said. “But having that letter of support just saying, ‘Hey, we think this is a good project,’ let us go get the money.”
As for WSDOT’s next steps, Francis reiterated that design changes, such as roundabouts and corridor narrowing, are key to triggering a formal speed limit reevaluation.
“We do have to do the studies on it, we can do those fairly quickly, as you’ve seen,” she said. “But that kind of context adjustment is what we’re looking for to be able to do those resets of speeds so that we’re not violating people’s expectation of the roadway and creating unsafe conditions.”
While design and funding hurdles remain, both city and state staff said they expect to continue coordinating on the corridor, project by project.
