Traffic troubles to be fixed at Ironwood & McKinley
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Updated: 11:55 PM May 27, 2008
Traffic troubles to be fixed at Ironwood & McKinley
Traffic trouble that's been talked about for almost 25 years will soon be addressed.
Posted: 11:26 PM May 27, 2008
Reporter: Erin Logan
Email Address: erin.logan@wndu.com
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Traffic trouble that's been talked about for almost 25 years, will soon addressed.

Back in November, the Indiana Department of Transportation presented a check for two million dollars to the City of South Bend to fix the intersection of McKinley and Ironwood.

The Common Council voted to approve the actual plan to fix the problem.

Since 1983, the City and the Department of Public Works have been trying to come up with a master plan to please the people who live near that intersection and those who have no choice but to travel through it to get to work.

Delays, delays, and more delays are definitely not what you want worked into your morning routine.

Clarence Williams says, “When you go to take a left turn you have traffic lock down that seems like 10, 15, 20 minutes to take a turn.”

Williams says you will never see him near the intersection of Ironwood and McKinley in the morning and early evening.

Tom Howard says unfortunately, he has no choice. It's the only route to get him to work.

Howard says, “You get stuck here with two to three red lights where you wait to get through and you can't make a right or a left.”

Public Works Director, Gary Gilot and the South Bend Common Council were pleased to come to an agreement on a two million dollar project to make this area picture perfect.

Gilot says, “We're going to preserve that neighborhood and make the intersection safer and smoother. We wanted ithere to be some landscape, some pedestrian scale lighting and some decorative bricks to make it look like a nice residential area.”

Of course, construction will mean more delays.

Williams says, “There will also be a lot of people upset.”

Gilot says bottom line, after 25 years of waiting to find a solution, five months to fix the problem will feel like five days.

He says they expect to get bids from contractors in about 60 days and work should start soon after that

Gilot expects the project to be done by the end of the year.

He says in the next week to ten days there will be a meeting scheduled mainly with the group of people who've been giving their input on proposals all along.



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