Road crews start work this week on a $2.1 million resurfacing project for Michigan Avenue in the west downtown. The work will bottleneck traffic to one lane in each direction between Washington and Brady until July 10, according to M-DOT officials.
By J. PATRICK PEPPER
Times-Herald Newspapers
DEARBORN — Work to resurface some of the worst parts of Michigan Avenue is scheduled to begin this week, and it could mean some headaches for motorists and local business owners.
Traffic will be restricted to one lane each way as crews work on the 2-mile stretch between Outer Drive and Brady. Traffic first will be shifted to the two westbound lanes and then switched over to the eastbound lanes once they have been resurfaced. The project is scheduled for completion by mid-July.
“It will definitely cause congestion issues on Michigan Avenue,” said Michigan Department of Transportation spokesman Rob Morosi.
Morosi, a Dearborn resident, added, “but I am adamant that people don’t avoid the area because these businesses will still be open, and there aren’t very many driveways on Michigan Avenue to begin with, so people will still be able to access (the businesses) through Garrison and Newman (streets parallel to Michigan Avenue on the north and south).”
The $2.1 million project includes patching potholes, adjusting drainage structures, grinding down the current concrete road surface and replacing it with asphalt. The work is coming nearly three years ahead of what MDOT initially had planned, thanks to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Shrinking revenues in the state’s road maintenance fund would have put the project off until 2013, Morosi said.
“There’s no local (funding) match, there’s no state match,” he said. “It’s paid for in full.”