Orange Beach city leaders have set in motion a $103,000 traffic study aimed at easing congestion and improving pedestrian safety along the coastal city’s busiest corridor. The City Council authorized Mayor Tony Kennon to sign off on three task orders with Birmingham-based engineering firm Sain Associates to carry out the work.
The study will focus on updating vehicle traffic counts across major roadways, developing a plan to modernize signals at 11 key intersections, and evaluating pedestrian safety upgrades along a five-mile stretch of Perdido Beach Boulevard, including a crossing near the state park’s Cotton Bayou beach access.
City officials said the last comprehensive traffic data for the area dated back to 2006, making it difficult to have informed conversations about current congestion levels. Community Development Director Kit Alexander told council members that fresh numbers were essential before any real planning could begin, noting that traffic volumes have likely grown substantially since the last count.
Data collection is set to begin over Memorial Day weekend, capturing patterns during peak summer travel, the Fourth of July, and Labor Day, along with quieter off-season periods for comparison. In addition to standard vehicle counts in both directions, the survey will track peak-hour turning movements at intersections as well as bicycle and pedestrian activity during high-traffic hours.
The signal upgrade portion of the study will explore adaptive signal technology similar to systems recently installed along Alabama 59 in neighboring Gulf Shores, where traffic lights use radar to detect vehicle speed and spacing, then adjust timing in real time through a fiber-optic network. Orange Beach officials indicated their approach could differ somewhat, potentially giving local police remote access to observe intersections and exploring a centralized system to keep signals synchronized during periods of heavy queuing.
The proposed signal improvements would touch two intersections along Orange Beach Boulevard (Alabama 161), five along Canal Road (Alabama 180), and four along Perdido Beach Boulevard (Alabama 182) — covering some of the most heavily traveled routes in and out of the beach community during peak tourist season.
City officials framed the effort as a necessary investment to keep pace with the area’s growth, saying reliable, current data would allow planners and engineers to make evidence-based decisions about where drivers and pedestrians face the greatest risks. The pedestrian safety review is expected to identify crossing points and roadway segments most in need of improvements as foot traffic between the beach and nearby businesses continues to increase.
The multi-part study reflects an ongoing effort by coastal Baldwin County municipalities to manage the strain that seasonal visitors place on local infrastructure, particularly along the narrow beachfront corridors that see dramatic swings in traffic volume between the off-season and peak summer months.