Ask 2: Is Highway 3 in Galveston County misaligned?

GALVESTON COUNTY, Texas – Question: Amanda Wilbert asked, “Why do several intersections along State Highway 3/Galveston Road between Clear Lake City Boulevard and Nasa Rd 1 not line up anymore? Is this permanent? If so, why??”

Answer: What Amanda is talking about are the dotted lines inside several intersections along SH 3/Galveston Road between League City and Webster. We asked the Texas Department of Transportation, and they said these are called “cat tracks,” which are striping used at intersections to let drivers know which lane to stay in. They recently finished a project on SH 3 that added turn and bike lanes, so some of these intersections had to be restriped. This made some lanes appear to be misaligned especially since the bike lanes are in between the turn lane and mainlanes.

TxDOT will continue to monitor these intersections to see if there are additional remedies they could implement to improve safety along SH 3, if the re-striping becomes a serious problem.