Feb 13, 2014 By Terry Kish 3 min read

Chip Dalesandro of Golden Triangle, the contractor for the Swallow Hill Road project, was at the Scott Township Commissioners’ agenda meeting on Feb. 11 to discuss detours, closures and timelines for the project.

Dalesandro, who met with the Chartiers Valley School District, Port Authority, Scott Township Police Department and traffic control engineers, said that the Swallow Hill Road detours will begin on March 17.

For those needing to get to the St. Clair Heights area or the St. Clair Hospital area and beyond, the established detour will be from Greentree Road to Old Washington Pike to Scrubgrass Road. Established in reverse order, the detour is Scrubgrass Road to Main Street/Old Washington Pike to Greentree Road for those travelers needing to get to that area and beyond.

There will be two phases of closures and accessibility. During the first phase, which is estimated to take between four and six weeks to complete depending on weather and utility work progress, Swallow Hill Road will be open to local traffic only from Greentree Road to Lindsay Road in both directions. Swallow Hill Road will be closed to all traffic, except for emergency vehicles, from Lindsay Road to Scrubgrass Road.

During the first phase, there will be a coordination of Columbia Gas utility work, starting on March 17. Golden Triangle will not begin their actual work until March 31, once the utility work is completed.

During phase two, which is estimated to take between three and four months to complete, there will be only one lane of local traffic beginning in the direction from Greentree Road heading toward Lindsay Road. From that point, there will be two lanes for local traffic in each direction from Lindsay Road to Scrubgrass Road. No traffic will be allowed to travel from Lindsay Road to Greentree Road during this phase.

Dalesandro told the board that there will always be a hard surface for emergency vehicles during the project, and that at no time would emergency vehicles be compromised.

Dalesandro also said there would be a lot of advance notification about the project, including signage and a meeting with residents with homes on Swallow Hill. “I’ll do whatever I have to for people to get in their driveways,” Dalesandro said.

Scott Township Public Works Director Randy Lubin said he hoped that people “will understand that patience and safety are a necessary component for a successful project, and a couple months of inconvenience will bring years of traveling on a high volume road in very good condition, unlike its present state.”