Fayette County officials today (Wednesday) will hear a Peachtree City request for $1.8 million in funding for a new cart path bridge over Ga. Highway 54 West near the city limits and also to add more lanes to the intersection of Peachtree Parkway and Crosstown Drive.
The county is also slated for further discussion for a similar funding request from Fayetteville for a roundabout at Ga. Highways 92 and 85 and Hood Avenue, which would cost an estimated $6.93 million.
Both municipalities are asking the county to pay for the bulk of those projects with funds remaining in the coffers from the five-year transportation sales tax that expired in 2009.
The cart path bridge sought by Peachtree City would span Hwy. 54 and connect the Shoppes at the Village Piazza development with a cart path segment along MacDuff Parkway, including a tunnel underneath MacDuff that eventually will allow access to shops on the north side of the road.
The project, which has long been referred to as the “Gateway Bridge,” could also be accessed via an existing path through the Planterra Ridge subdivision and the Line Creek Nature Area. The city already has acquired some of the necessary land required for the project.
The roundabout proposed for Fayetteville would be just west of the current intersection of Hwys. 85 and 92, and the existing traffic signal would be moved southward to the current Hood Avenue intersection, to allow the current Hood Avenue to be used to access the roundabout.
Fayetteville officials have said the roundabout, by consolidating Hood Avenue and Hwys. 92 and 85 at one intersection, will drastically improve traffic safety in the area, as there are a number of accidents at the unsignalized intersection of Hwy. 85 and Hood Avenue.
The project also includes a new access road to the east of the intersection that would allow traffic to reach Kathi Avenue at a new roundabout to replace the current 3-way stop and ultimately Jeff Davis Drive.
Doing so, however, will result in the elimination of a row of shops at the Hudson Plaza shopping center which includes Rocky’s Barber Shop, a Papa John’s Pizza, Play It Again Sports and a long-time eatery in Fayetteville: the Golden Chopsticks Chinese restaurant.
Traffic engineers for the city also considered rerouting the eastern leg to go through the existing Michael’s store in the same shopping center, but doing so would decimate the largest tenant in the shopping center.
