FLORENCE – Didn’t expect the highway construction delay on southbound Interstate 75 over the weekend?
Should have checked the Weekly Road Report for District 6 on the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet website at http://transportation.ky.gov/district-6.
Didn’t anticipate that accident that backed up Mt. Zion Road (KY 536)?
Could have accessed the WAZE app you can download from the Kentucky Transportation website.
That’s the message from Nancy Wood, the public information officer for District 6. Her department is trying to communicate as much information on state highway construction as possible in as many ways as possible, she told members of the Florence Rotary Club at a meeting on May 15.
Wood gave the Rotarians a demonstration of features on the website designed to keep citizens up to date on highway construction activity and road alerts/delays. She also discussed work on the $26.1 million Mt. Zion Road project and additional improvements to follow.
The Weekly Road Report lists all current construction projects in the 11 counties in District 6. Recent changes or additions are noted in red. A check of the site before traveling can alert you to delays, lane closures and other highway conditions.
The Kentucky Transportation website also includes interactive highway maps for each county. The interactive map link enables you not only to find details about a specific project but also to call up an aerial view of the work on a home computer.
Waze is a free GPS-based app that provides real-time highway information and navigation on smartphones and tablets. The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet provides traffic alerts to the app. Motorists also can report accidents, traffic jams and other problems as they encounter them.
The widening of Mt. Zion Road from two lines to five is now well underway all along the 3-mile route from U.S. 42 to the I-75 interchange, Wood said. The project, scheduled for completion in fall 2018, will add curb and gutter improvements, a new storm sewer system and multi-use paths.
The best may be yet to come at the I-75 interchange, according to Wood. A second project will transform the diamond design into a “diamond crossover” design, she said.
Wood showed a video of the design that eliminates the left turns across traffic off the exit ramps through a cross-over pattern that enables motorists to drive on the opposite side of the highway for a short distance. (See I-75 I-71 DCD interchange at Mt. Zion Road on YouTube.com)
Video narrator Jennifer Caroland said the design will reduce the number of potential conflict points and speed the flow of traffic through the intersection. The double crossover diamond reduced the number of accidents at New Circle Road and Harrodsburg Road in Lexington by 40 percent in its first year, she said.
