Jan. 31, 2017 – There’s expected to be a large turnout tonight for the Highway 60 Reliever Route Public Input Meeting. It gets underway at 6:30 p.m. at Hartford Town Hall, 3360 Hwy K.
This may be one of the only opportunities for Washington County taxpayers to express their concern about the project. There is an online “Public Input Comment Form” about the Reliever Route available by clicking HERE.
The Reliever Route is being proposed by Hartford and Washington County to help ease some of the truck traffic on Highway 60. There will be no money coming from the state for this project and all taxpayers in Washington County will be directly impacted by the costs.
Just last week engineers reviewed four segments of the road project. Washington County Highway Commissioner Scott Schmidt and Jeremy Hinds with K. Singh & Associates stressed they had a 30% study and they would still be going “back to the drawing board.”
A couple of new details from that presentation included:
-anticipated costs increasing from $20 million to $23.9 million.
-a SEWRPC study also indicated the lost farm acres would increased from 38.9 acres to 52.6 acres.
-the number of residences impacted have also increased from 43 to 53.
-the reliever route project ends at the western side of the bridge over the railroad tracks west of I41. Early word is the county is not anticipating doing any work on the I41/Hwy K interchange.
“Neighbors are bringing up concerns about safety issues related to poor sight lines to that entrance from the east as you are traveling west on Highway K,” said Elaine Gehring, a member of the No Reliever Route committee. “We’re concerned as well with the close proximity of the trucks’ entrance onto Highway K and Indian Road, which is used by all buses and parents going to/from Addison School.”
-details on the impact on the peat bog/wetlands has yet to be defined. It’s anticipated 80 feet of peat moss will need to be removed before construction of the road bed in that area. No environmental studies or geotechnical borings have yet been completed.
More details on the proposed project are expected to be unveiled tonight.