Contractors now are working on the Eaton Avenue leg of the intersection, getting the sub-grade ready and bringing in stone that will be laid down before that roadway is paved. They also soon will be working on curbs.
“Their plan is to complete it by early September,” he said.
The Main-Millville-Eaton crossroads is a high-crash area, which from 2008-2010 had 50 wrecks, ranking it among among Ohio’s “Top 100 Non-Freeway Fatal and Serious Injury Locations” at the time.
Because it is a high-crash location, the Ohio Department of Transportation is paying for 90 percent of the estimated $3.2 million cost. The project also should improve traffic flow.
Around June, the construction crews will start focusing on the Eaton Avenue part of the intersection. That will are will be able to be finished by September, including its curbs and paving, Engle said.
In addition to making the intersection safer — by squaring off the angles at which the streets meet —while also improving traffic flow, Hamilton officials plan to add some flair to green spaces that will be created by reconfiguration of the intersection.
The non-profit City of Sculpture organization plans to do that, using private donations, by adding an eye-catching, 25-foot-tall metal sculpture called Embrace.
Of 50 crashes, from 2008-2010, 10 involved vehicles that were turning left, while 27 crashes were caused by vehicles hitting others from behind. Within a 0.3-mile segment of the area, there were 80 wrecks.
Engle has said the intersection work will create “a big improvement” for traffic flow in the area.
As is typical for such intersection work that is aimed at improving safety, the Ohio Department of Transportation will pay 90 percent of the costs, with Hamilton paying the remaining 10 percent of the approximately $3 million project. That was the same ratio of funding by the state and city on the intersection of High Street with Martin Luther King Boulevard.
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