A contractor for the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet is continuing to install updated signage along 38 miles of Interstate 69 through Lyon, Caldwell, and Hopkins Counties. The sign installation work prompted highway officials to remind motorists to continue to use old signs and mile points while the work continues.
KTC spokesman Keith Todd, said motorists should be aware the old mile points and exit numbers from the Wendell Ford-Western Kentucky Parkway will remain in use by area 911 emergency dispatch centers until the existing signs are removed.
“We want the public to be aware that they should continue to use the old mile markers to report traffic crashes and other emergencies,” Todd said. “We will attempt to provide timely notice when the contractor starts to removed the existing signs.”
Before the updated I-69 signage can go into use, the contractor must remove trees and brush that now block the view of some of the new signs. In some cases, the old signs will block the view of newly installed signage until they can be removed
Motorists should be aware that several sign crews will be working at various locations along Interstate 69/The WK Parkway between Eddyville and the WK Parkway Interchange with the Pennyrile Parkway near Madisonville over the next two weeks or more. In most cases, the crews will only require shoulder restrictions as they go about their work. Motorists are urged to slow down and use appropriate caution anytime they enter a work zone where equipment and personnel are on or near driving lanes
The sign work is the final phase of $9.9 million in upgrades for 2012 aimed at meeting current Interstate highway standards along the 38 mile section. The work included reconstruction of a ramp at the I-69/WK Parkway Interchange with Interstate 24 in Lyon County. That ramp widening and extension effort, as well as work to increase the vertical clearance on an overpass near the Hopkins-Caldwell county line and overpasses at KY 91 and KY 293 in Princeton, is substantially complete. Additional upgrades are being planned
Todd said one of the more challenge issues for both motorists and 911 emergency dispatch centers as everyone moves to the new signs will be the reorienting of the roadway from an East-West designation used by the Wendell Ford-Western Kentucky Parkway to a North-South designation for Interstate 69. He anticipates the old signs will be removed by sometime around Christmas.