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AUSTINTOWN -- The first phase of an ODOT plan to remove a bridge in the township is underway.
Mahoning County commissioners Thursday approved a resolution by the county engineer to close Lanterman Road for repaving, but that is only part of a bigger picture.
The Mahoning County Engineer's Office has not specified a timeline for the work.
More dramatic changes will follow.
ODOT originally proposed demolishing the Lanterman Road bridge, which spans Interstate 680, in 2019, but that plan was shelved during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2024, Austintown Township officials learned the plan was back on the table.
The project will result in Austintown taking over maintenance of a road that the county and state have maintained for more than 60 years.
"There's a process that takes place, because now it's a dead end cul-de-sac, so it's no longer a county highway," said Township Administrator Mark D'Apolito. "The township takes care of what I call neighborhood streets. They are not needed to navigate the county for commerce or transportation, and they don't really go anywhere but people's houses."
By virtue of demolishing the bridge, ODOT essentially will convert Lanterman Road from a county road to two separated neighborhood roads, for which the township is now responsible.
D'Apolito said ODOT will adjust the township's share of statewide gas tax to account for the additional 1.5 to 2 miles of road it will have to maintain, although that money already does not come close to providing the support townships need for upkeep. That is why the county's 0.25-percent sales tax and local operating levies are critical, D'Apolito said.
The paving of the road, he said, is the good will of Mahoning County Engineer Pat Ginnetti.
"We don't necessarily like it when he passes a road off to us, but he almost always goes over it once more to get it into good shape, to ensure that it's not an immediate cost to us."
But the larger concern isn't the cost of upkeep. By demolishing the bridge, township officials say, ODOT is closing off an access route for emergency vehicles.
Once the bridge is gone, the main detour would take traffic along Raccoon Road onto Crum Road, to Meridian Road, then up to Lanterman Road. In 2019, when the fire department first heard of the idea, then-Chief Andy Frost conducted a test to assess the adjusted response time.
Running a truck from Station 2 at Wickliffe Circle — the closest station to the Lanterman Road neighborhood — and taking the adjusted route ODOT proposed, the fire department found it would add 3:22 to their response to the closest house on the side of Lanterman that would be cut off - from 4:31 to 7:53.
Fire Chief Dave Schertzer and Capt. Brandon Wirtz, who heads the department's EMS operations, said in 2024 that even seconds count and 3.5 minutes could be catastrophic.
"The general rule of thumb used to be that a fire doubles in size every minute," Schertzer said. "But now it's more like 30 seconds."
Schertzer said the department ran the routes from both ends of Lanterman and the stations that would service the road.
"There's only a few houses that, from Station 2, would be delayed by a few minutes," he said. "The thing is we don't want to create any longer response times anywhere. But the state controls the hammer on that and they did their traffic assessments and disagreed with our times."
D'Apolito said there seems to be little the township can do to prevent the project from moving forward as is, though.
"ODOT wants to abandon that bridge because their cost analysis says it's not worth maintaining," he said. "We have a good, close working relationship with ODOT, but we hope they can come to another solution. We believe that the bridge is still of value and there may be property there that is primed for future development."
ODOT's analysis stated that: "the steel superstructure was found to fail in both the sheer and moment capacity. Since the current structure fails in sheer over the center piers, coupled with the condition of the protective coating system…it is likely to be more cost effective to replace the entire superstructure."
The report shows ODOT's estimate of just over $2 million to replace the structure, and $4.2 million to replace and maintain it over its lifetime. By contrast, removing the bridge and installing cul-de-sacs at the separation points in those neighborhoods will cost about $450,000.
District 4 spokesperson Ray Marsch said cost definitely is a factor, but ODOT has considered other aspects.
"The bridge…is nearing the end of its useful life. There are under 400 vehicles that travel this roadway every day," he said. "There are various other options to cross I-680 in this area."
ODOT's current plans state that the bridge will likely be removed in 2028 or 2029, as part of the north end phase of its larger I-680 rehabilitation project.
On a related note, commissioners also approved Ginnetti's resolution to close Rosemont Road between Mahoning Avenue and the southern driveway of Our Lady of the Lakes Church beginning on Sept. 11 at 5 p.m. and reopening Sept. 14 at 5 a.m. to complete the widening construction of Rosemont as part of the Mahoning Avenue Industrial Corridor Upgrade project in Jackson Township.