Oak Ridge Today

City to use traffic camera money for parking lot work at Blankenship Field

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Red-light Camera at Oak Ridge Turnpike and New York Avenue

The Oak Ridge City Council agreed last week to use $180,000 in traffic camera money for improvements to the lower parking at Blankenship Field.

 

The Oak Ridge City Council agreed last week in a 5-2 vote to use $180,000 in traffic camera money for improvements to the lower parking lot at Blankenship Field, which is used for football games and high school graduation.

The request from Oak Ridge Mayor Tom Beehan was reviewed at a City Council work session on April 28.

The work could include resurfacing work at the lower parking lot and access to the lower levels and visitors bleachers under the American with Disabilities Act. The project has been reviewed by the city staff, and it could include resurfacing, ADA improvements, handicapped parking, and new pavement and striping.

The work would complement a project to replace the demolished visitors bleachers at Blankenship Field, a $455,000 project that was unanimously approved by the Oak Ridge Board of Education in March. The bleachers had been deemed unsafe, and school officials are hoping to replace them before the first home football game on Aug. 29. The school board agreed to use the school system’s fund balance to pay for the replacement bleachers. [Read more…]

Highway 116 improvements still planned, schedule uncertain

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Information from WYSH Radio

Following up on a story we first brought you last year, the state is still in the planning stages of making safety improvements to an 11-mile stretch of Highway 116 in Anderson County from Frost Bottom to the Campbell County line.

A safety audit conducted in 2012 by state and local officials showed that in some spots, lanes are too narrow, in others there are no guardrails, and in still other areas, the shoulder is actually less than a foot wide. Slope stability issues were also blamed for some cracking and uneven settling of the pavement. Some spots that have been resurfaced do not have pavement markings and in other areas, rock outcroppings and other hazards are “too close to the roadway for comfort.”

The Tennessee Department of Transportation has recommended paving the entire stretch of Highway 116, widening the shoulders in some places, and adding guardrails, pavement markings, and signage to the roadway as part of the effort to make the road safer. TDOT says that it will also reduce the speed limit on that sometimes-dangerous stretch of road to 35 miles per hour. [Read more…]

Resurfacing of 25 streets starts Saturday

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Resurfacing of parts of 25 Oak Ridge streets is scheduled to start Saturday.

“The project will begin on Wisconsin Avenue with repairs to correct surface and drainage problems, which will be followed by concrete work by city personnel to correct drainage problems,” a press release said. “This project will generally proceed from west to east.” [Read more…]