OU students may’ve noticed on their morning commutes to campus: There’s a new roundabout on W. Union Street.
While contractors spend the first half of fall semester finishing an overhaul of water and sewage lines underneath West Union Street, they leave a glaring sign of their work on the road above.
Athens’ third roundabout.
The new piece of infrastructure is part of a larger project that may yield a price tag of possibly more than $1.3 million and sits at the corner of W. Union and Smith Street, near Ohio University’s West Union Street Office Center.
The project, according to a city document, primarily looks at replacing water lines and improving stormwater management.
“The roundabout was a small addition in an area where we were doing a lot of other work anyway,” Andy Stone, city engineer and public works director, said.
The corner has long been a headache for motorists and pedestrians, Stone and Mayor Paul Wiehl said, since railroad tracks that once crossed nearby were removed.
“There was a belief expressed by community members and city staff that the Smith Street intersection ‘felt unsafe’ because of the odd geometry and driveway cuts, and that there were a lot of near misses there,” Stone told The Post in an email Tuesday.
It’s the city’s third roundabout, along with the well-traversed interchange between Richland Avenue and State Route 682 and a mini-roundabout near Highland Park just north of Uptown.
Wiehl, who formerly worked at Ohio University and commuted through the area from his home on the west side, said he’s long thought the intersection was “problematic.”
The trickiness doesn’t stem from an overwhelming number of cars, he said, but another thing entirely.
“I didn’t think it really was a traffic issue,” Wiehl said. “But there is a lot of speed there.”
Wiehl said that’s a sharp contrast from the Richland Avenue roundabout, which was constructed to improve traffic capacity.
“I think I look at the one on Union (Street) as ‘traffic calming,’ ” Wiehl said.
But at least on Monday, trucks hauling tractor trailers could be seen struggling to maneuver the curve without scraping their tires on or driving on top of the curb.
Wiehl said he doesn’t expect contractors to do much more work on the roundabout, beyond adding signage and shaping up the landscaping.
Stone said the projected completion date for the West Union Street project is October 11, leaving time before thousands of partygoers descend on Athens for Halloween Weekend.
“You can traverse it,” Wiehl said. “It’s done.”
@emilybohatch
eb346012@ohio.edu
