News from Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission

For more information contact: Carl DeFebo, 717-920-7176

Northeastern Extension Project Continues With Focus on Reduced Community Impacts

Engineers altering project designs after input from public meetings.

HARRISBURG, PA (07/26/2007; 1236)(readMedia)-- The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, working with state legislators, township officials and the Montgomery County Planning Commission, continues to move forward with the development of engineering design plans for the total reconstruction and six-lane widening of 10.5 miles of the Northeastern Extension (I-476) between the Mid-County Interchange (exit #20) and the Lansdale Interchange (exit #31). In fact, preliminary engineering design plans revealed to the public this spring are now being revisited; new alternatives are being designed and evaluated to see where residential impacts may be minimized, if not eliminated.

Turnpike work currently under way includes evaluation of alternative engineering designs in new locations for storm water basins that could ultimately result in significantly reduced residential property impacts.

“Right now, we are looking at a number of alternatives to the proposed storm-water management basin locations in the southern section of the project area and will continue with this process along the corridor north toward Lansdale,” noted Gerald H. Rollman, project manager for the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. “The plans for the new design considerations are not available for public review because there is a lot of work that remains to be done and a need to coordinate with the regulatory agencies to ensure their requirements can be met.”

The Turnpike’s project team is conducting a significant amount of fieldwork that includes infiltration testing at new potential basin locations to verify that the basin will function properly. Noise monitoring is also under way throughout the corridor. Noise monitoring will take place in some locations where no noise walls were shown on the preliminary plans and in other locations where noise walls were proposed as a mitigation measure to gather data necessary to optimize noise wall designs.

Public comments -- received at the Turnpike’s plans displays this spring and at other public forums held by state and township officials -- have been influential in the project’s alternative engineering design work currently under way.

“We continue to receive comment via e-mail, U.S. mail and telephone and we are working to respond to each individual inquiry,” added Rollman. “We have responded to several hundred inquiries and are continuing to do so. The majority of inquiries we receive are personalized so we appreciate everyone’s patience as we respond to each person.”

Nearly 800 people attended the Turnpike plans display held on March 29 and April 10 of this year. Since then, the Turnpike project team continues to meet with Montgomery County lawmakers as well as officials from Towamencin, Upper Gwynedd, Worcester, Whitpain and Plymouth townships. Additionally, members of the Turnpike project team have attended township meetings and are conducting incident-management meetings with the townships in the corridor.

“We will be going back out to the public to show the proposed final-design plans for this project,” said Rollman. “We do not have a definite time frame for those meetings at this point. That information will be publicized on our project web site (www.paturnpike.com), in local papers and shared with township and county officials and state legislators.”

From south to north, the boundary of the Northeastern Extension total reconstruction and six-lane widening project traverses five townships in Montgomery County -- Plymouth, Whitpain, Worcester, Upper Gwynedd and Towamencin – where unprecedented growth has contributed to increasing traffic congestion on the Turnpike and surrounding highways. Originally opened in 1957, this 10.5 mile section of roadway carries more than 67,000 vehicles per day, making it the single-busiest stretch of four-lane toll road in the entire state.