ODOT will spend $20 million in I-80 work at Liberty, Girard

LIBERTY — Mosier Road resident Fred Callihan won’t be too inconvenienced by a planned closure of his road as part of a state project, but his neighbors may.

“Mosier is a well-traveled road,” said Callihan, who has lived there for 30 years.

Ohio Department of Transportation District 4 plans to improve Interstate 80, rehabilitating five bridges and extending the entrance ramp from state Route 193 along the interstate. It will require Mosier to be closed for about 90 days and closure of the westbound entrance ramp from Route 193 to I-80 for about 180 days.

“I seldom go that way,” Callihan said.

Others who do, though, will have to redirect their route a couple of miles out of the way, he said. Possible alternatives include up Liberty Street, down Belmont Avenue and down Trumbull Hill or up U.S. Route 422 to Trumbull Hill, Callihan said.

At $20 million, the project has the highest pricetag of any planned for 2010 in District 4, which includes Mahoning, Trumbull, Ashtabula, Stark, Summit and Portage counties.

The bridges to be rehabilitated are the twin bridges over both U.S. 422 and state Route 193 and the bridge over Mosier, said Paula Putnam, ODOT District 4 spokeswoman.

An open house about the project is set for 5 to 7 p.m. July 23 at the township administration building, Churchill-Hubbard Road.

The entrance ramp will be extended from Route 193 westbound about 110 feet east of the centerline of Liberty Street. The bridges will be widened, the decks replaced and the bridges painted.

Putnam said that ODOT discovered, as it planned to rehabilitate the bridges, that the entrance ramp doesn’t meet current standards. It’s neither wide enough nor long enough, she said.

Detours for the project haven’t been determined.

Read more in Thursday’s Vindicator and Vindy.com