By PAUL GIANNAMORE
STEUBENVILLE - A report from the Ohio Department of Transportation to the Brooke-Hancock-Jefferson Metropolitan Planning Commission lists the bid award date for the Fort Steuben Bridge demolition for June 9, though the razing may not happen until early 2012.
Roxanne Kane, Ohio Department of Transportation District 11 planning administrator, said the state can't begin the work until at least the fall, and she does not anticipate work on the demolition to begin until next winter.
Kane presented a list of ODOT projects that are scheduled for bid letting in early 2011, including repaving on state Route 43 from Richmond to Amsterdam; pavement milling and filling on state Route 7 from the Costonia interchange to the JFK Highway overpass; milling, filling and median replacement on state Route 7 from near Brilliant to Steubenville; bridge work on state Route 7 south of Steubenville and Mingo Junction; and bridge replacement on county Road 38 over U.S. Route 22 west of Bloomingdale that will involve a detour of county Road 38.
Projects in Brooke County detailed by Alana Slack of the West Virginia Division of Transportation included the continuation of the Market Street Bridge rehabilitation and painting, to involve closing the bridge from March 14 through October. Work is scheduled to be done between March and August on lights in the Veterans Memorial Bridge area along U.S. Route 22.
In Hancock County, she said rail crossing work is scheduled when the weather clears on the Cove Road crossing. Repairs to the Jennings Randolph Bridge and approach are tentatively scheduled to start in the spring, but Slack said the date probably will be later.
In other matters, BHJ Executive Director John Brown said commission members will have a communications chore ahead this year with the large number of new state and federal political leaders taking office.
"The number of newly elected officials is unprecedented," Brown said.
He said the new leaders may not be familiar with major projects being sought for the area, such as the Wellsburg-to-Brilliant Ohio River bridge.
"They don't know who BHJ is and they control where we get our dollars," Brown said.
Brown said the annual BHJ awards dinner will be held Oct. 5 at the Serbian-American Cultural Center, 1000 Colliers Way, Weirton.
The next BHJ full commission meeting will be March 23 at the commission offices, 124 N. Fourth St.
(Giannamore, the business editor for the Herald-Star, can be contacted at firstname.lastname@example.org.)