Route 534 study moves closer

By DORIS COOK - Staff Writer
Star Beacon

June 26, 2008 10:04 pm

— JEFFERSON — A corridor plan study by the Ohio Department of Transportation for the areas along Route 534 north to Route 531 inched closer Thursday.
Ashtabula County commissioners approved the agreement between ODOT, county commissioners and six other communities in the corridor area to be studied.
Ashtabula County Planning Department director Albert Dispenza called the multi-jurisdictional study for developing the area along the two major highways a “first” for the county because of the collaboration of all local governments. The commissioners are paying $10,000 toward the study with the remaining $40,000 split up by Geneva-on-the-Lake Convention & Visitors Bureau, GOTL Village Council, Geneva and Harpersfield Township trustees, Geneva City, Geneva Area Chamber of Commerce, and the Harpersfield-Geneva Joint Economic Development District (JEDD II).
“I see that area becoming the economic center of Ashtabula County,” Dispenza told the commissioners as they inked the agreement.
The commissioners paid $1,000 to Cleveland-based consultants, Michael Baker Jr. Associates, to file the grant application plan with ODOT. Dispenza said ODOT has requests for proposals out for hiring the consulting firm to do the lengthy plan study.
He said the study will include traffic management, lane uses, zoning, economic development and any future ODOT highway improvements.