What design the Central High School Board will proceed with for its new entrance/exit on Highway 83 south of Highway 50 is awaiting another meeting with the state Department of Transportation.
District administrator Scott Pierce said he and board President Mary Ellen Pearsall have scheduled a meeting with Art Baumann of the state DOT for later this month. This week, Pearsall and Pierce will meet with their attorney to prepare for the DOT meeting.
Neither Pierce nor any board member commented on what might happen at the meeting.
“We’ll have something to report back to you next month,” Pierce said.
The board again did not take action on a pending contract with a consultant to design a roundabout intersection.
How to construct the intersection for the new entrance has been a matter of indecision for the district for months. The board originally sought a traffic signal controlled intersection. The DOT, however, said such an intersection was not warranted at the spot. Highway 83 is a state highway giving the state authority.
Rejecting the signal controlled intersection left the school with two apparent options. It could build an intersection with a stop sign only for traffic leaving the school road or a roundabout. The state has said building the stop sign intersection would necessitate the school also paying for improvements at the Highway 50 and 83/75 intersection. It is not clear whether the school would be obligated to make the improvements by 2013 or just if the school population reaches a certain level. But the school might be freed of any other road work obligation if it constructs the roundabout.
The lack of a final decision on the entrance/exit seems to contradict an article in the district’s Community Report newspaper, mailed last week. In that article, Pierce wrote the board “reluctantly chose to proceed with a roundabout configuration.”
When I asked him about the statement via email, Pierce replied that the article was written in October, when it seemed the roundabout was going to proceed. Subsequently, circumstances changed, he said.
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Hey Folks, The board meeting just ended an hour ago and westoftheI was there and posted this story so you don’t have to be. While people should show up and be involved we all know that that is not reality. So it’s good to know that Darren was there reporting on the important issues of the meeting. Sure we may also read about it in the Kenosha News but I’ll bet that tomorrows paper won’t have it all or possibly it may even be bumped to the next day. We’ll see. In the mean time support WestoftheI by supporting his advertisers as we need to encourage and embrace this ” NEW MEDIUM”. Chris Skrzynecki