The Wisconsin Department of Transportation held its first public meeting on proposed improvements to state Highway 22 in Shawano on Tuesday.
The project will focus on Main Street from County Road B to Zingler Avenue, and Green Bay Street from Main to County Road BE.
Construction is expected to take place in 2019.
The DOT listed several issues needing to be addressed along the route, including deteriorating pavement; deteriorating railroad crossing surface on Green Bay Street and a need for improved signals and new gates; traffic signal timing changes for an improved traffic flow; and a deteriorating culvert and guardrails at Murray Creek just west of Rusch Road.
Several other improvements are still being evaluated, according to the DOT, including curb ramp upgrades, sidewalk continuity along East Green Bay Street, improvements to the Mountain Bay Trail crossing near Lakeland Road and a review of the Highway 22/County Road B intersection.
Stephanie Christensen, a designer with the DOT’s consulting firm, EMCS Inc. of Wausau, said the current plan doesn’t call for improvements to the the County Road B intersection, but it will get a closer look.
She said the most recent traffic counts were taken before Shawano Medical Center’s relocation to County Road B last month.
If improvements are deemed necessary to the intersection, it would have to be a separate project, she said.
About two dozen people attended the meeting at City Hall, with some raising concern about the impact on traffic and access to businesses along the route.
DOT Project Manager Dan Erva said there could be some delays but otherwise no access problems.
The road will remain open to traffic, with only single lane closures expected.
The exception to that, however, will be the replacement of the railroad crossing, which will require a detour for one or two weeks.
A second public meeting will be held in the spring or summer of 2016, after preliminary plans have been drawn up.
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