Nearly $70 million in road construction projects are currently under way in Washington County, and projects worth millions of dollars more are expected to begin in the next few years.
Tennessee Department of Transportation officials have been touring the state this week to look at projects. Thursday the tour went through Washington and Sullivan counties.
Two projects going on now in Washington County are the widening of Tenn. Highway 36, also known as North Roan Street, from near the Bristol Highway to Tenn. Highway 75 and the widening of Tenn. 75 toward Tri-Cities Regional Airport in Blountville.
TDOT’s Jason Farmer said workers are relocating utilities and building retaining walls for the North Roan project.
Three of six retaining walls have been completed. Grading operations will pick up once all those walls have been built, he said.
The expected completion date for this project is September 2014. Once done, the road will be five lanes with a curb and gutter. This project, which will stop at Tenn. 75, cost $41.9 million, and work began in late January.
“It allows for more cars to get through the area when we have an incident on I-26,” Farmer said. “Traffic’s able to be kicked over from Boones Creek Road or from the Gray exit onto (Tenn. Highway) 36 and allow for traffic to get around if we have an incident between there.”
The project on Tenn. 75, which will be known as Airport Parkway, should be finished by next spring.
This $26.3 million project should alleviate congestion and give better access to the airport to people in Washington, Carter and Unicoi counties, Farmer said.
“On the Washington County side of the project, almost all utilities are completed with the relocation,” he said. “We still have some at the intersection we have to do. When the job’s done it’ll be five lanes as well with 10-foot shoulders, center turn lane all the way through.”
Dwight Armstrong, TDOT project manager, said construction on a $1.1 million roundabout for the Five Points intersection in Jonesborough should begin by late spring or early summer. This project is in the right-of-way acquisition phase now, he said. Construction could take 18 to 36 months.
TDOT and Jonesborough officials began discussing issues surrounding Five Points in 2009.
“By a majority consensus it was decided that a roundabout intersection would best serve to improve the safety conditions in that area because of a significant vehicle crash rate,” Armstrong said.
A roundabout has low maintenance and a common effect on traffic flow, he said.
Complaints about this intersection have been raised for years.
“The Five Points intersection has angle intersections from (Tenn. Highway) 81 going into (Tenn. Highway) 353, and there’s heavy truck traffic that goes into Depot Street,” Armstrong said. “The vehicle crashes were primarily angled and the heaviest traffic flow was going from (Tenn.) 81 into (Tenn.) 353, so we have to address and reduce the vehicle crashes in that area.”
Steven Allen, director of project planning at TDOT, spoke about two interchange projects on Interstate 26, at the University Parkway and Boones Creek Road exits.
“We’ve been asked to look at modifying those interchanges because of existing operations and safety issues,” he said. Those plans “are currently under development.”
The biggest issues with these interchanges is traffic queuing up back onto the interstate.
The cost for these two projects have not yet been determined because the needed improvements are not known. That information should be known in six months to a year.
It could take three to five years for these projects to be completed.