MANSFIELD — Mansfield hopes to “go big” with two potentially federally-funded, multi-million dollar road construction projects on the city’s north side.
The city’s Board of Control on Tuesday will be asked to contract with K.E. McCartney & Associates to do preliminary design work and assist in completing an application for about $2.5 million in federal grants.
Those grants would be used to just design the two projects — each of which would cost far more than $5 million to construct.
One of the projects would install a large, single-lane roundabout to “improve the connection of North Main and North Diamond streets” to improve traffic flow and to also create a multi-use path that would extend the Richland B&O Bike Trail from North Lake Park to Main Street.
The second would improve and widen Ohio 13 from the northern U.S. 30 ramp to Airport Road, including a left-hand turn lane along the corridor and installing a large, single-lane roundabout at the intersection with Harrington Memorial Road.
City engineer Bob Bianchi said Friday the city hopes to obtain funds through the federal Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) program, which helps communities around the country carry out big-ticket projects with significant local or regional impact.
“The idea of these projects … these are big projects,” Bianchi said. “We want to have big projects in Mansfield.
“The federal government has infused $1.5 billion into the (RAISE) program for fiscal year 2022. We want to make sure we raise our hand to try to get dollars for these projects.”
If grant funds are obtained to do the design work, the city would then apply for additional RAISE grants to do the actual construction, Bianchi said.
The hope is if the federal program deems the projects worthy of design funds that it would then believe them suitable construction funds, the engineer said.
Significant and continuing growth at industrial park sites near Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport has led to the need for an improved Ohio 13, according to Bianchi.
The Main Street Corridor Improvement Plan, currently being designed, will likely result in the street converting to two-way traffic. Bianchi said a roundabout at the site would better facilitate the changed traffic flow.
Roundabouts are also safer for traffic than traditional intersections, according to the engineer.
He said the city’s only current roundabout, a smaller version installed in 2012 at the intersection of Middle Bellville and Straub roads, has reduced accidents at the site.
“The roundabouts we are talking about for these projects would be much larger to accommodate truck traffic,” the engineer said.
The work at North Main and Diamond streets would also fall in Census Tract 31, which Bianchi said is a “historically disadvantaged community and an area of consistent poverty.”
“That status will afford us the opportunity to be very competitive (in the application process),” he said.
The deadline for applications is April 14 and selections will be announced no later than Aug. 12.
