No new safety paths next year

Repairs and drainage improvements are in store for the safety path on Miller Road, but residents on Indianwood Road who are waiting for a path of their own might have to wait a while longer.
The Orion Township Board of Trustees voted Nov. 15 to authorize township engineers Orchard, Hiltz and McCliment to prepare a cost estimate for repair work on Miller Road, and also for the township to seek 50/50 drainage funds from the Road Commission for Oakland County for the repair and/or improvements of drainage on Miller.
The township safety path committee recommended the board get estimates to repair the Miller path in the area where county road construction has created a drainage problem on the existing path.
In regards to construction of a safety path on Indianwood Road, trustee Michael Gingell, who is a board representative on the safety path committee, said due to money used for the recently-completed path on Clarkston Road, there were to be no big safety path projects planned for next year.
‘With the Clarkston path, we don’t have a lot of money left,? he said. ‘We can maybe use some of the maintenance fund for the Miller path.?
Gingell said in 2005 the township may have some safety path money left over, allowing a few small projects to be done.
‘Then we could start planning the next big project for 2006 and beyond,? he said. ‘That could be Indianwood Road.?
The current safety path millage runs through 2007.
‘Maybe we should procure the easements before we do anything else on Indianwood Road,? said treasurer Jim Marleau.
Parks and recreation director Rock Blanchard said the township has already gotten all but one easement on Indianwood.
‘I don’t think we’ll get that one, unless we do something different,? Blanchard said.
Marleau said the easement Blanchard was referring to was the golf course, on the south side of Indianwood.
In addition to the estimate for Miller, the board also voted to authorize engineers to prepare estimates for safety paths on Baldwin, Indianwood and Orion Roads.
The path on Baldwin would be the east side, between Waldon and Eaton Gate. On Orion Road, it will be for two sections on the east side, between Atwater and Corners, and between Corners and Flint.
The safety path on Indianwood would be the south side, from Joslyn to Fernhurst.