Washington County OKs six-month closure of Southwest River Road for deep sewer work; vote 3-1

The Washington County Board of Commissioners on Sept. 23 approved a six-month closure of Southwest River Road to allow installation of a deep sanitary sewer required for the Witch Hazel South urban expansion. The board voted 3-1 to approve the full closure, which staff said would start about two weeks after the vote and enable construction of a gravity-fed sewer tie to a pump station at Davis and River Road.

County staff and the project contractor told the board the work requires extensive shoring and heavy equipment because the trench reaches roughly 34 feet at its deepest point and runs in the middle of the roadway. Steven Roberts, Land Use and Transportation director, and the county engineer said those conditions reduce safe space for flagging and that doing the work under intermittent flagging would more than double the construction timeline — from about six months to an estimated 11–14 months — and increase worker and public-safety risk. “Most of the available right-of-way is used up by this equipment,” the county engineer said during the presentation.

The project…