About 230 local residents, elected officials and first responders met Feb. 5 to discuss possible measures to make Hwy. 30, from High Ridge to House Springs, safer for drivers and pedestrians.
Councilman Brian Haskins (District 1, High Ridge), who organized the event, said the High Ridge Fire Protection District meeting room at Station 1 was packed with people concerned about the current conditions of Hwy. 30.
Haskins said many factors make the highway unsafe, including the posted speed limit, intersections without safe pedestrian crossings and a lack of adequate acceleration lanes.
“(The town hall) was a huge success,” he said. “About 90 percent of the crowd raised their hands, agreeing that the speed limit should be lowered. There’s never been such an outpouring of support to see change.”
Haskins said he received about 75 comment cards before and during the meeting from residents, adding that local representatives were available during the event to hear concerns from the community.
In addition to Haskins, county councilmembers Lori Arons (District 3, Imperial), Tim Brown (District 6, De Soto) and Bob Tullock (District 7, House Springs) attended the meeting, along with state Reps. Cecelie Williams from District 111 and David Casteel from District 97, and Byrnes Mill Mayor Rob Kiczenski. Many other local law enforcement officers, paramedics/EMTs and firefighters were also available to speak with residents.
Public Works Director Jason Jonas, High Ridge Fire Chief John Barton, North Jefferson County Ambulance Chief Jamie Guinn, Undersheriff Tim Whitney and MoDOT area liaison Jordan Dalaviras all spoke at the town hall.
“We’re all here tonight to achieve something that’s possible,” said Haskins, who moderated the town hall. “We should have a path forward now and in the future. Our goal is to make Hwy. 30 better, safer and a big part of that is having you all show up.”
Haskins said there are 10 stoplights within 7.4 miles on Hwy. 30, and upwards of 40,000 cars travel the highway daily. Hwy. 30 is no longer the rural expressway it was designed to be 50 years ago, Haskins said.
One of Haskins’ largest concerns is the intersection at High Ridge Commons, leading to the Walmart shopping plaza. Haskins said there is no acceleration lane there for northbound vehicles, which can lead to dangerous conditions as vehicles pull out of the Walmart parking lot and attempt to merge with traffic.
He said the speed limit of 60 miles per hour is too fast for the area. MoDOT recently changed the speed limit on Hwy. 30 from 60 to 55 miles per hour from the county line to the Little Brennan Road intersection, about a 2.8-mile stretch, but Haskins said the speed limit should be reduced past Little Brennan as well.
Haskins said there were 12 fatalities along Hwy. 30 last year.
According to MoDOT, from 2016-2020, there were 1,620 crashes within a 20-mile stretch of Hwy. 30 in Jefferson County, from Hwy. Y in Grubville to Old Sugar Creek Road in the Murphy area in unincorporated Fenton.
Jenni Smith spoke at the meeting about her daughter, Annabelle, who was killed Nov. 23 in a crash on Hwy. 30. Annabelle, 18, was a freshman at Jefferson College at the time. She graduated from Northwest High School in 2025.
“She was taken from us far too soon, and our family will never be the same,” Smith said. “No family should ever endure what we have been forced to live through. (Annabelle’s) father, Chad, and I are here tonight united because Hwy. 30 is dangerous, and we need to see change.”
She said the once rural road is now lined with high-traffic intersections, new shopping centers and neighborhoods, adding that highway safety measures have not kept pace with the new developments.
“In recent months, our community has seen multiple serious crashes along the highway, including 30-year-old Alyssa Kalbach of High Ridge, when she was walking near Upper Byrnes Mill Road in November, another senseless life lost just one week before our daughter was taken from us,” Smith said.
Kalbach, a mother to two young children, died Nov. 16 after being struck by a pickup while she was walking on Hwy. 30 east of Upper Byrnes Mill Road. The driver of the pickup, a man from Dupo, Ill., left the scene but later the same day turned himself in to police, the Missouri State Highway Patrol reported.
Smith called on MoDOT and local officials to make changes on Hwy. 30 that she said would make driving the highway safer, including lengthening turn lanes, adding acceleration and deceleration lanes at major intersections, enhancing signal timing to prevent red light running, and stringently enforcing the speed limit.
“I know there are numbers and statistics behind the concerns we’re raising, but please know this: behind every statistic is a family destroyed,” Smith said. “My daughter’s smile, her plan for the future, her kindness, those are gone because of this highway and its current state. We need change, not tomorrow but right now.”
First responders
Chief Barton said the High Ridge Fire Protection District has seen a 400 percent increase in accidents on Hwy. 30 in the last three years. Last year, Barton said the fire district responded to about one accident on Hwy. 30 every three days. This year, though, he said there was an accident every two days.
Barton said he was at the crash that took Annabelle’s life.
“It’s an unspeakable tragedy, and it’s something that we’ll never forget either,” he said. “We need to do whatever we can to make Hwy. 30 safer than it is right now.”
Undersheriff Whitney, a 2000 Northwest High graduate, said he grew up learning to drive on Hwy. 30.
“If anybody in this room went to Northwest High School, almost certainly you were touched by the loss of somebody who was in one of your classes,” he said. “That was just an unfortunate reality of high school for us. Growing up here, I think we accepted a lot of times that Hwy. 30 was dangerous, but I don’t think that should be the norm.”
Whitney said Sheriff’s Office deputies wrote 2,044 tickets and issued 2,993 warnings on Hwy. 30 in 2025, adding that Hwy. 30 citations make up nearly 20 percent of all citations given in the county.
Engineers
Public Works Director Jason Jonas said the county does not have the authority to make safety changes to Hwy. 30, but his department is working to make many of the county-owned adjoining roads and intersections safer for motorists and intersections.
The Walk-Bike Jefferson County Master Plan, approved by the County Council in February of last year, highlights six intersections on Hwy. 30 that need pedestrian accessibility, Jonas said.
In particular, Jonas said his department is focused on the High Ridge Commons intersection.
“We already have pedestrian facilities along this wonderful boulevard (High Ridge Boulevard) that we completed in 2024, as well as High Ridge Commons and all the sidewalks they provided during that development,” Jonas said. “Now we just need to connect it. That’s kind of the first priority from the county standpoint, is we want to work with MoDOT over the next few years to get that safe pedestrian crossing across Hwy. 30 at High Ridge Boulevard and High Ridge Commons.”
MoDOT liaison Jordan Dalaviras said his department has finished or is working to complete several safety countermeasure projects. Some of those countermeasures include reflective back plates and safety flashers on traffic signals.
An ongoing $13.9 million project is working to upgrade guardrails, make pavement and bridge deck repairs, and resurface the roadway along Hwy. 30, from I-44 in Franklin County to Hwy. PP in High Ridge, Dalaviras said.
In 2027, Dalaviras said the same roadway improvements should be implemented from north of Hwy. PP to the St. Louis County line. Funding has not been finalized for this portion of the project, he said.
“With this, our consultant who is working on the (project) designs is also taking a look and analyzing these intersections, just as Councilman Haskins talked about with these acceleration and deceleration lanes and the signals -- what can we put into this project?” Dalaviras said. “There’s more to come, and that’s also what tonight is about, hearing what the community wants so that we can try to program more into that project.”
Based on conversations he had with Tullock and Haskins before the meeting, Dalaviras said MoDOT will be looking to block drivers from crossing over both northbound and southbound lanes on Hwy. 30 from Lower Byrnes Mill Road to Indian Springs Road, and vice versa.
“To make a project like that happen, it takes community support just like this,” Dalaviras said.