Our road district has been focused on mowing, patching, sealing, grading, and rebuilding our county roads since my last update. To help focus the application of our limited resources we just completed an informal traffic study over a 6 square mile area bordered by from Broadway to Coltrane and Forest Hills to Simmons Road. This study confirmed the common sense need to focus on the worst areas that are most frequently traveled.
One good example of this increased traffic is at Bryant and Simmons. The study especially pointed out that there is a lot more traffic on Bryant at the west entrance of Cascata Falls than expected. Based on this traffic study, and current road conditions, we intend to start next spring with a 2″ overlay on Bryant from Waterloo North to its end and on Simmons between Bryant and Coltrane. This fall we will have those collapsed and pushed out areas on Bryant and on Simmons between Coltrane and Broadway milled and patched. Our plan is to have this area completely repaired by October 2016 and repaved by August 2017.
Under the topic of watching grass grow, our still closed county bridge on Seward Road west of Broadway is awaiting ODOT and the bridge engineers to agree to create an approved design for reconstruction. This approved design is required before ODOT will put the repair and reconstructing out for bid. So, we continue to wait for slow but incremental movement forward on this project.
Next Tuesday, July 5 2016 Atlas paving will begin paving the new asphalt surface layer for the mile of Charter Oak between Western and Pennsylvania. They should finish by Thursday, July 7th. I know the folks who live in the Summit and surrounding area will be happy to have this project finished, so will we so we can turn our attention now to other areas.
We continue the preparation of Forest Hills between Sooner and Coltrane for a new asphalt surface layer of 3” of type B hot mix asphalt. Our county road crews will continue to improve the shape, grade, and drain on that mile over the next few weeks where needed in preparation for paving. Atlas paving won the contract and should start paving not later than the week of July 18, 2016. Again we look forward to getting this mile finished this summer.
The week of July 11 we will begin clearing trees on the 1 ½ miles of ditch and right of way on both sides of Simpson Road between Coltrane and Ward Road. This phase should take around 3 weeks to clear and grub the right of way. Once the trees, undergrowth, and rubble is removed we will begin to improve the shape, grade, and drain of the right of way to bring it up to county road standards. We will be working this stretch of road over the next several months. Please watch out for our workers.
Until next time, be safe out there on our county roads and bridges.
Marven Goodman
Commissioner
Logan County, District 1
Work: 405 282-3581
commissioner@commissiondistrict1.com