Add two more major stretches of road to the list of orange barrel routes this spring.
A week after the Road Commission for Oakland County announced their major road projects for 2005, state and local governments announced road closures of their own.
The Michigan Department of Transportation will do repair work on the Sashabaw Road bridge over I-75, causing the closure of Sashabaw between Clarkston and Waldon roads, from April 1 through May 19.
An Independence Township water and sewer project meanwhile, will cause ‘road closed? signs to be erected on Andersonville Road between White Lake Road to Curtis Lane from April 4 through July 30.
The announcements were made by the county road commission, but Public Information Officer Craig Bryson said the word came to them only when the other government units applied for road closure permits.
‘I don’t think we’ve been aware of it very long,? Bryson said of the Sashabaw project, noting that MDOT is in charge of the freeway and the bridges over it.
Many breathed a sigh of relief last fall when major work was completed on Sashabaw between Waldon and Maybee roads. Some final intersection and landscaping work was expected this year, but the bridge work on Sashabaw is separate from the joint county-township boulevard project.
MDOT is also expected to rebuild the M-15 bridge over I-75 this summer, but details of that project have yet to be released.
Attempts by The Clarkston News to reach MDOT representatives on Monday were unsuccessful, and the agency’s Web site was down.
The newly-announced projects join a list which includes a 1.5-inch ‘preservation? overlay on Clarkston Road between M-15 and Flemings Lake Road and on Pine Knob Road from Clarkston Road to the end of the pavement.
Clintonville Road at both junctures with Maybee Road (at the I-75 overpass) will be widened to accommodate a new traffic signal. Work is expected to begin in July at a projected cost of $750,000.
The Sashabaw-Clarkston road intersection will also be widened, with a hill cut on the north leg, at a projected cost of $1 million. Work is tentatively scheduled to begin this fall, depending on developer coordination and right-of-way acquisition.