State Eyes Redesign Of Orleans-Eastham Rotary

EASTHAM – Accidents are a common occurrence at the Orleans-Eastham rotary. And in the future, the threat of serious flooding exists if changes to the rotary’s design aren’t made.

 The state Department of Transportation last week held an open house at the Eastham Library, where four potential options for redesigning the rotary, which is in a flood plain, to address safety and flooding concerns were presented.

 MassDOT narrowed a list of 17 potential design options down to a final four that it is considering moving forward with. Those include putting in a traffic light to manage the follow of traffic onto and from Rock Harbor Road, two options that would utilize two smaller roundabouts and a fourth option that would raise the rotary to a higher elevation while keeping its existing design intact.

 “We’re really at the early stages of this project,” Doug Johnson, a program manager with MassDOT, said during the April 30 open house. “We haven’t made any final decisions about what this rotary will finally look like in the future. And it’s really key to get your feedback before we move forward into design.”

 A low-lying roads study conducted by the Cape Cod Commission in 2023 identified the rotary as being “extremely susceptible” to flooding in the future. Projections provided by MassDOT indicate that portions of Route 6 near the rotary could by 2070 be inundated with water at high tides. More imminently, by 2050 portions of Route 6 could be under five feet of water in a 100-year storm.

 “It doesn’t flood today,” Johnson said. “There aren’t any issues with flooding at high tide or during storms. But based on our projections there will be an issue with flooding in the future if we don’t do something at the rotary.”

 The rotary is also the site of frequent crashes, Johnson said, mostly in the form of rear endings and angled collisions caused by people merging into the rotary. 

 “It will be interesting to see what they do and how they address some of the challenges that we have down there,” Orleans Fire Chief Geof Deering said when reached after the open house. “None of them are typically serious, but we do have crashes down there pretty regularly.”

 The first option involves replacing the existing rotary with a smaller roundabout and installing a traffic signal at Rock Harbor Road. Alternatively, the rotary could be modified to allow for right turns onto Rock Harbor Road and right turns from the road onto the rotary without signalization, Johnson said. This option would not only improve traffic safety and reduce flood risk, but also improve conditions in the existing salt marsh.

 “The center of the rotary right now is essentially a disconnected salt marsh from the rest of the salt marsh,” Johnson said. “There is a hydraulic connection, a small culvert under Route 6, but it does not allow the passage of water that’s really necessary for this to be…a healthy habitat.”

 But some in attendance at the open house had another idea: Don’t change the rotary at all.

“The greatest thing about this rotary? It’s big,” said Jim Bandera of Eastham, who formerly spent 12 years on the town’s planning board. “You could put 40 cars on it and you wouldn’t even know that they’re there.” Bandera also suggested that a local contractor could fill and elevate the rotary at a lesser cost than the estimated $7 million proposed by MassDOT. 

“I’m saying leave it alone,” he said. “Raise it up and you’re done.”

The third option of elevating the rotary above the flood plain most closely aligns with that suggestion. Johnson said the work would involve raising the rotary approximately seven feet from its lowest point. 

Johnson said local police and fire departments were most in favor of the first and third options. Options 2 and 4, which call for two small roundabouts, might pose operational problems in terms of moving public safety apparatuses through those configurations, he said.

Beyond improvements to the rotary itself, MassDOT is also looking at constructing a berm or seawall along a portion of Route 6 near the Cape Cod Rail Trail to protect that stretch of the roadway from flooding.

“It won’t be a drastic change, unlike some of these alternatives, but we would be advancing a project there to prevent flooding on that part of Route 6,” Johnson said.

Johnson said that construction on any of the design options is at best years away. He said construction would not begin before 2031, noting the estimated five-year timeline for getting the necessary permits for the redesign in place.

Another open house to discuss the design options is being planned for June in Orleans, Johnson said.