HERMITAGE Funding shortage delays road work

The job would be done in two phases and not completed until 2007.
By HAROLD GWIN
VINDICATOR SHARON BUREAU
HERMITAGE, Pa. -- The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation plans to widen and improve a 1.12-mile section of Highland Road, but it doesn't have the money to do it yet.
Karl Ishman, assistant district engineer for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, said Wednesday that the state wants to do the $6.4 million project in two phases, the first from Buhl Farm Drive to Kerrwood Drive and the second from Kerrwood to Pa. Route 18.
The first section has a total price of $3,150,000, and the second, a cost of $3,275,000, but only $1.5 million has been set aside for the work so far, he said.
Design is nearing completion on the first section but has only begun on the second, he told a group of about 25 area residents who showed up for a meeting at the city building Wednesday night to hear what the state is planning.
When
Ishman said the first section is to be done in 2005; the second won't be done until 2007.
Rita Ferringer, owner of Best Real Estate Inc. at the corner of Dutch Lane and Highland Road in the second phase, said that may be too long to wait.
She's been pushing PennDOT for years to put a traffic light at her intersection, pointing out that it is the scene of frequent and sometimes serious traffic accidents.
The traffic will only get worse when a proposed new Wal-Mart Supercenter opens on nearby Route 18 in about a year, Ferringer said.
Ishman said the state may be able to make some temporary improvements to the intersection now and do a complete rebuilding in 2007.
Local officials have been after the state for years to improve the traffic flow along that section of Highland Road, and the PennDOT plan would widen the 20-foot roadway to 35 feet, which would include a center turning lane.
The intersections with Clarksville Road and Buhl Farm Drive would be completely revamped, with Clarksville getting its own traffic light.
Bikes, pedestrians
Additional turning lanes will be added, at all intersections and both sides of the road will have a paved, five-foot shoulder for bicycle and foot traffic.
There are no sidewalks along Highland, and PennDOT won't be building any, but the project does call for a 7-foot graded area along both sides for placement of sidewalks sometime in the future.
Not everyone was thrilled with the plan.
Representatives of the 260-unit Little Acres apartment complex that has units on both sides of Highland in the second section said the road is already dangerous and widening it won't improve the situation.
They said there is a lot of foot and golf cart traffic across Highland Road that would be endangered by a widened road that will only encourage motorists to drive faster on the 35 mph road.
Ishman said designers will consider that problem as they complete their work.
The plan calls for PennDOT to take 12.5 feet along both sides of the road in the first section to provide space for the widening.
The plan requires the taking of 25 feet along the north side only in the second section, Ishman said, noting there is a cemetery and apartment parking on the south side in that area that would prevent widening the road on the south side.