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Show Early Approval Anticipated For Realignment of Utah-12 In a telephone conservation about the proposed realignment of a section of Utah State Highway 12 near Calf Creek, representatives in the office of Senator Jake Garn stated that the Senator "is hopeful that the Bureau of Land Management, will move rapidly to allow the road realignment to be approved." The section of roadway became the subject of controversy recently wiien it was learned that the Utah Department of Transportation had proceeded to make changes on the roadway without proper right-of-way from the BLM. UDOT had planned to realign a dangerous curve on Utah Highway 12 near the Calf Creek Recreation area between Boulder and Escalnte. Protests by people concerned about environmental impact halted the project until a draft Environmental Assessment could be preapred and public comment received before the BLM makes a final decision on whether to give the go ahead on the work. TheDEA has now been completed . on the section of roadway near mile post 75 on Utah Higwhay 1 and the document is available for review and comment before the Feb. 7 deadline set by the BLM. Public input on the proposed change which would realign approximately 1,000 feet of highway to eliminate a dangerous horse-shoe curve on the section of highway is being sought by the Bureau of Land Management which prepared the DEA with the help of the Utah Department of Transportation, BLM personnel and other sources. A 30-day period for comments has been specified by the BLM ending on Feburary 7. Proponents of the change have (Continued on Page 4) Utah-12 Route ; Change Told . (Continued from Page I) i claimed that the hazardous curve I creates an extremely dangerous I situation for school buses which travel the road on a daily basis and that trucks and other large vehicles J are unable to stay In their own : traffic lane when making the turn. The DEA suggests two possible alternatives to realigning the sec tion of road. The first, a no-action choice, would leave the curve as is but lists many negative factors involved: the width of the highway is only 20 feet at one point, steel dowels and a piece of pipe are used to hold the shoulder in place, and the cracking of pavement indicates a stuffing off of the road base. The assessment also points out that under the no-change choice, the road on the north side of the cliff is shadowed most of the day during winter months, leaving snow and black ice when the rest of the road is dry; steep drop offs on the north and west sides of the road create a hazzard; and the curve in question is a blind one with a very short sight distance. In addition, three known accidents have occurred on this particular segment of road. The second alternative suggested in the DEA would be to widen the existing curve but concern was expresed that the debris from blasting a 60-foot high cliff would fall into the canyon along Calf Creek. Widening the curve would not correct the short sight distance and will leave the same horse-shoe curve but it would improve the safety factor greatly. Additional traffic from twice to five times the summer rate is anticipated with the paving of the Boulder-Grover Road, increasing the chance for accidents on the road. The negative impact from realignment would be small, the DEA claims, with only the cut, not the road itself, showing from a quarter mile section of the Calf Creek Trail. Under the proposed realignment the width of the road would be 29 to 30 feet of paved surface The width flk- t the cut through the sandstone would " be 36 to 40 feet at the bottom and about 50 feet at the top. The radius of curves would be between five and ten degrees maximum with a grade not to exceed 10 percent probably , averaging about 8.5 percent. : Approximately 580,000 cubic fcj yardi of material would be ex- I . - cavated but there would be no ex- cess since all would be used in the $L new roadway prism to construct the T embankment and approaches. The i'A grade at the lower end of the project J: would have to be raised for a X distance of about 400 feet to achieve m I ', the desired grade line. at Work on the project would require K from 12 to 18 months to finish since fix . local state road crews would have to J sandwich it in between routine road $' maintenance jobs which have a higher priority. |
