8:39 p.m.: Road condition stops mail

By Brandi Watters

April 06, 2008 08:37 pm

— ALEXANDRIA — The county road that runs past the homes of Butch Lewis and Mike Kemp of Alexandria was once surfaced with the standard tar and chip asphalt common on rural roads.
Nowadays, the one-mile stretch of County Road 1300 North between Indiana 9 and County Road 100 East northeast of Alexandria is a mixture of mud, potholes and crumbled stone.
The road has gotten so bad in the past year and a half that the Alexandria post office can no longer deliver mail to the two remaining residents living along the road.
Neither Kemp nor Lewis has received mail at their addresses in the past year and a half, and both wonder when their road will be safe enough for mail again.
The Alexandria post office was not available for comment at press time but confirmed that both residents were set up with PO boxes at the local post office.
Non-stop truck traffic during the construction of Poet’s ethanol plant is being blamed for the road’s ruin but plant officials say they are not responsible for its repairs. “We build plants, not roads,” said Nathan Schock of Poet.
Lewis was against the construction of the plant from the beginning and even displays a sign in his front yard detailing his position. The sign reads: “I oppose the ethanol plant.”
He was unable to stop the construction of the plant and now says he’s paying the price. Lewis is disappointed by the unfulfilled promises of county officials. “They told me that (the road) would be fixed in February, then they said March. Now it’s April and there’s never been stone put on it.”
Poet took matters into its own hands and resurfaced a portion of the road, according to Bob Berens of Poet. “We did that at our own expense just so we could bring traffic into our site for construction and the grand opening.”
County Commissioner John Richwine is aware of the problem on 1300 North. “The road probably wasn’t perfect before they got there. It is terrible at the moment.”
The county will soon devote a great deal of tax revenue from the plant to the construction of new roadways. “The repairs will be paid for by Poet through their TIF (tax increment financing) dollars that we’ll capture,” Richwine said.
Lewis is upset that his section of roadway was not given similar attention. “Down where the grain trucks enter, there’s new stone. They filled the holes up so the grain trucks can get in without any problems.”
Lewis’ complaints are echoed by his neighbor, Kemp, who argues that the road has impaired more than mail delivery. “The school bus won’t even come down this road. My fiancée has to go a half-mile to the corner to Summitville Road to drop the kid off at the school bus and to get picked up every day.”
“My four-wheel-drive is broke and the suspension is trashed. The farmers ran (my fiancée) off the road several times. All they saw was dollar signs in her eyes. A tractor-trailer hauling corn nearly ran over the front end of the car,” Kemp alleged, saying that the road is not safe to drive on and has caused property damage.
He understands why the school buses won’t risk the drive. “It’s not really safe for the school bus, the bus is top heavy. It would teeter side to side coming down this road and possibly tip over.”
Kemp agrees with Lewis that the road was ruined by Poet traffic. “For a year, there was non-stop dump truck traffic on a road that wasn’t made for it.”
Berens argues that county officials knew what construction of a plant would do to the area roadways. ‘We’ve been under construction for almost a year. It’s county jurisdiction, which includes the county roads and the county approved the zoning ordinance for us to build there. The county has known of our intentions for a year and nine months now.”
Poet agrees that roads need to be improved. “We don’t own any roads and so it’s a county road. We as a new addition to the community would also like to have nice roads so we can bring our customers.”
While the road is a priority for the county, Richwine says it won’t be the first fixed. “It won’t be the first road to be worked on because the type of road surface that will go in there will require some engineering. Basically, the reconstruction of that road will be toward the end of summer.”
While Richwine is sympathetic to those living on the road, he argues that the county cannot spend money to fix the road temporarily when a major reconstruction is planned. “You just can’t throw money away on something that’s going to turn around and get torn up on trucks going through there.”
The new road, Richwine says, will be built by this fall to handle abundant truck traffic. “When we’re done, it’ll be one of the better roads in Madison County.”

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