Widening project is on track

The Davis Road and Walton Way Extension widening project remains on schedule for a February completion, transportation officials say.

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Cissy McNure, a Georgia Department of Transportation spokeswoman, stated in a recent e-mail that the $22 million project to widen Davis Road and Walton Way Extension from Washington Road in Columbia County to Skinner Mill Road in Richmond County is about 80 percent complete.

The project will widen the roads to four lanes and include a new interchange for Walton Way Extension at Interstate 20 and new bridges spanning the expressway.

Work crews with Reeves Construction Co. completed the first bridge spanning I-20 several months ago, and the second bridge that will carry southbound lanes of Walton Way Extension is nearly finished, McNure wrote.

"In the upcoming weeks we will be placing concrete paving on the south and north sides of the bridge, and install the traffic signals to control the on- and off-ramp intersections (with I-20)," McNure stated.

Transportation officials have said they hoped to have the interchange with Walton Way Extension and I-20 completed before work begins on the three-year, $192 million Bobby Jones Expressway/ I-20 interchange project.

"The Walton Way (Extension) overpass will not be open when the Bobby Jones construction starts," she stated. "But we do foresee having it open in the latter part of the summer to accommodate the various stages of construction at Bobby Jones."

In Columbia County, crews are constructing new curbs along Davis Road and are beginning to remove existing sidewalks and curbs along Washington Road. This will make room for a second westbound left-turn lane and an eastbound right-turn lane from Washington Road to Davis Road, McNure stated.