Hillcrest Drive will be closed beginning Monday, Aug. 30, for a period of three weeks to facilitate the ongoing Hillcrest Drive Rehabilitation Project, Director of Engineering Micah Siemers said Friday.
The closure will extend from just west of the round-a-bout at Silver Lake Road and Price Road to the current Hillcrest detour at Shawnee Avenue just south of the high school.
“So essentially the entire length of the roadway that is adjacent to the construction that has been accessible via detour will no longer be accessible during this period of time,” Siemers said. “This closure is necessary to construct the connection between the new roadway alignment and the existing alignment just north of the Caney River. Closing the road completely will expedite the work and avoid having the road narrowed to one lane of traffic with temporary traffic signals and long delays for a longer duration of up to eight weeks.”
The $2.2 million project, approved by voters in the 2013 Half-cent Capital Improvement Projects Election, involves reconstructing Hillcrest Drive from the Caney River to just north of 20th Street. The new roadway will consist of two 12-foot-wide drive lanes with six-foot-wide asphalt shoulders. Turn lanes will be provided at Shawnee Avenue and 20th Street, and a pedestrian path in the area will be provided by maintaining some of the existing roadway.