For the second year in a row, Northwest Third Street and Harrison Boulevard is the most dangerous intersection in Corvallis.

But Northwest Ninth Street and Northwest Circle Boulevard isn’t far behind.

The Corvallis Police Department has ranked the 10 most dangerous intersections, based on accident statistics, as a first step in developing a traffic safety management plan designed to focus on reducing the number of accidents through increased enforcement. Officers are sent to high-accident intersections on what are called directed patrols to write speeding tickets and catch drivers who run red lights.

“We want to increase public awareness,” said Corvallis Police Lt. Dave Henslee, “so when they come to these intersections they can be more vigilant.”

Corvallis averaged just more than nine traffic accidents a day in the 2006-07 fiscal year for a total of 345. In about one third of accidents there was at least one person injured. There were no fatal accidents within Corvallis last year.

The number of accidents at the 10 most accident prone intersections in Corvallis was up almost 12 percent over last year, according to police department statistics. The top intersections for the fiscal year 2006-07 had 66 accidents, up from 59 the previous year.

There are no real surprises on the top 10 list. At least not for the people who work near them.

“I’ve seen people come sailing through these intersections,” said Doug Kaess, who owns G&J Tire and Automotive at the corner of Northwest Third Street and Harrison Boulevard.

Kaess said police sometimes sit at the intersection around 4 or 5 p.m. and issue tickets almost non-stop.

“And they’re justified,” said manager Jeff Twitchell.

Twitchell estimated there was an accident a month near the store, and he wasn’t far off. At 11 accidents for the year, that intersection was No. 1 on the list. It was also No. 1 the previous year with 14 accidents.

The two men said they think the main reason for accidents on Harrison between the bridge and Ninth Street is that people come off Highway 34 at 50 miles per hour and don’t really slow down, even though the speed limit for the bridge is 25 miles per hour. Kaess said it was a good idea for people waiting for the light as they head north on Third Street to pause before proceeding.

“You want to make sure those cars (on Harrison) are stopping even though your light is green,” Kaess said.

Some of them are fender-benders, but Kaess and Twitchell said it’s rare that a car drives away from an accident on that stretch of Harrison — more often they get towed. When a truck smashed into a small car last year, Twitchell knew it right away even though he didn’t see it happen.

“We felt the impact here at the front office,” he said.

The employees at Jiffy Lube on Highway 99W and Northwest Circle Boulevard knew their intersection must be on the top 10 list, too.

“I’ve seen quite a few accidents here,” said Jake Bullock, “particularly the stretch from Ninth to 99W.”

Northwest Ninth Street and Circle was No. 2, with 10 accidents, and one block over, Highway 99W and Circle, was No. 8 with five.

Bullock said lunch time is when he sees most accidents. Employees from Hewlett-Packard and other businesses come to the area for lunch, and the traffic keeps up pretty much through the afternoon.

Tom Wall, who works at Dairy-Mart at Southwest Fourth Street and Western Boulevard, the No. 3 intersection, said he’s seen half a dozen accidents that he can think of in the past seven years, usually after someone ran a red light.

“People say they didn’t see the light,” Wall said, although he thought some people may have been trying to beat it.

Analyzing individual intersections only tells part of the story, although. The section of Harrison Boulevard from Southwest First Street to 12th Street saw 44 accidents last year. The same stretch of Van Buren Avenue saw 21 accidents.

Henslee said people trying to get in and out of town during rush hour are impatient.

“We were seeing people running red lights,” he said, “but now we’re seeing more people following too close.”

Either way, the congestion caused by cars waiting to get over the river to and from Highway 34 is a major factor, according to Henslee.

Deb Fuston agreed. She is a paralegal in the Benton County District Attorney’s Office and lives in Lebanon. She tries to get to the office a little earlier than her 8 a.m. start time because the traffic is a lot lighter. But the worst is the evening commute home at 5 p.m.

“It’s bumper-to-bumper. I’ve sat between Fourth and Fifth street(s) (on Van Buren), through three or four lights,” Fuston said. And it doesn’t help that Van Buren goes down to one lane. “The bottleneck is unbelievable.”

Fuston has never been in an accident there herself, but she has seen them happen. She’s been living in Lebanon for 10 years and said traffic has been getting heavier over the years, but she hasn’t noticed any dramatic increase lately.

The top ten intersections shift from year to year as police focus on enforcement and bring the accident rate down at a given spot. In a three-month period between April and July this year, officers made a total of 24,307 traffic stops. There were 2480 speeding violations and 8126 intersection violations.

Police want drivers to become more aware of the accident hotspots so they can be more cautious. And more patient.

“Patience is the key here,” Henslee said.

TOP 10 ACCIDENT-PRONE INTERSECTIONS

1. Northwest Third Street and Harrison Boulevard

2. Northwest Ninth Street and Circle Boulevard

3. Southwest Fourth Street and Western Boulevard

4. Northwest Ninth Street and Harrison Boulevard

5. Highway 99W and Northwest Conifer Boulevard

6. Northwest Fifth Street and Harrison Boulevard

7. Southwest Philomath Boulevard and 35th Street

8. Highway 99W and Northwest Circle Boulevard

9. Southwest Ninth Street and Jefferson Avenue

10. Northeast Circle Boulevard and Four Acres Road

Source: Corvallis Police Department