March 22, 2012
03/23/12 Monday morning the Marshall County Commissioners were presented with two awards for the Pine Road/Pioneer Road Extension Project.
Laurie Johnson from DLZ Engineering explained that the project was a state finalist award winner from the American Council for Engineering Committee (ACEC). DLZ had been selected by the County to provide a comprehensive range of services to complete an alignment study and then the design of the new road which is south of Lincoln Highway to State Road 17 and the alignment north of Lincoln Highway to just shy of US 30. The primary purpose of the project was to improve traffic flow in the area by extending the existing roadway.
Through public meetings and other challenges such as wetlands and acquisition of property a route was selected. The completion of Pioneer Road and Pioneer Drive has been successful, receiving positive feedback from Marshall County and the traveling public.
The second award was an Indiana Partnership of Transportation Quality (IPTQ) award for rural road projects. The awards were given to DLZ Engineering, Rieth-Riley, and Marshall County. The Indiana Partnership for Transportation Quality, a partnership of fourteen Indiana agencies, industry associations and academia is dedicated to continuous quality improvement in the planning, design, construction, and maintenance of Indiana’s highways. This Quality Awards program was created to recognize Indiana projects, both large and small, which exemplify outstanding quality, teamwork, innovation, safety and customer focus. The winners of the Quality Awards are selected from nominations submitted by state, city, contractors, designers and county contracting authorities. Winners were recognized at the Purdue Road School earlier this month.
Johnson told the commissioners, “We really appreciate the opportunity to work on this job, and I would be remiss not to also thank MACOG — they did a lot of work on this (project),” said Johnson.
“This road is definitely an asset to the community,” said commissioner Kevin Overmyer. “We had our rocky moments at times, but everything worked out.”