Going from six lanes to eight on busy stretch

By Pat Andrews
Beacon staff writer

posted Jan 31, 2013 - 7:19:28am

West Volusians who shop or dine along busy Saxon Boulevard in Orange City can look for traffic relief in a year or so, after the roadway is expanded from six to eight lanes between Interstate 4 and Enterprise Road.

The Volusia County Council awarded a $4.4 million contract to low-bidder Masci Corp. of Port Orange to do the widening, along with installing medians and other improvements.

A grant from the Florida Department of Transportation will reimburse the county for up to $1.44 million of the cost. Another $2.7 million will come from gasoline-tax bond funds, and $248,363 from the water and sewage utilities fund will pay to relocate utilities in the area.

County Engineer Jerry Brinton described Saxon Boulevard as “very busy in the evenings” with people driving in and out of restaurants and shopping-center parking lots into busy and fast-moving traffic.

“We’ve been having lots of collisions and near-collisions,” Brinton said.

Medians will prevent motorists from making left turns from those parking lots onto the roadway. They will be forced to make right turns, then travel down the road to a cut-through lane to turn around.

An outside eastbound lane will become a ramp onto I-4 eastbound.

There will be no lane-shifting, Brinton said, but six through lanes all the way along the stretch.

Brinton told the County Council it will take about a month for the contractor to mobilize. After that, motorists in the area should expect lane closures, though there will always be one lane open in each direction. The widening should take about a year to complete.

— pat@beacononlinenews.com

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