After more than a year and a half, the southbound lanes of a heavily traveled road in Lycoming County are open again. Not only that, Route 15 is safer, according to PennDOT.
There were 50 crashes on Route 15 south between Trout Run and Buttonwood in the five years leading up to construction work, said officials. The hope now is a road once considered to be dangerous is a safer drive than it was before.
Cars and trucks are once again cruising down the mountain along Route 15 south near Trout Run. That stretch of road has undergone a big facelift since March, 2008. Some sections are not as steep as before and sharp curves are a thing of the past.
It is part of a $60 million project PennDOT officials said was decades in the making.
"Kind of like a snake road going down a steep grade. There were a lot of sharp turns, with the increase of truck traffic it was hard to navigate," said PennDOT District Engineer Sandy Tosca.
More than five miles of road are officially reopened to traffic. There are new bridges and a new retaining wall.
"It was just a deadly mix of a road and weather conditions and trucks that needed to be corrected with this highway," said Mark Murawski. Murawski is president of the Route 15 Coalition.
The entire project is expected to wrap up in fall, 2010.
There is still work to be done on the northbound lanes which until now have been down to one lane while crews worked on the southbound lanes.
There were 50 crashes on Route 15 south between Trout Run and Buttonwood in the five years leading up to construction work, said officials. The hope now is a road once considered to be dangerous is a safer drive than it was before.
Cars and trucks are once again cruising down the mountain along Route 15 south near Trout Run. That stretch of road has undergone a big facelift since March, 2008. Some sections are not as steep as before and sharp curves are a thing of the past.
It is part of a $60 million project PennDOT officials said was decades in the making.
"Kind of like a snake road going down a steep grade. There were a lot of sharp turns, with the increase of truck traffic it was hard to navigate," said PennDOT District Engineer Sandy Tosca.
More than five miles of road are officially reopened to traffic. There are new bridges and a new retaining wall.
"It was just a deadly mix of a road and weather conditions and trucks that needed to be corrected with this highway," said Mark Murawski. Murawski is president of the Route 15 Coalition.
The entire project is expected to wrap up in fall, 2010.
There is still work to be done on the northbound lanes which until now have been down to one lane while crews worked on the southbound lanes.
