The county will extend Stinemyer Road, which currently ends at CR 550W, and connect it to CR South 500W (Gem Road) by School Street near the administration building for Southern Hancock Schools. This view is from School Street looking west. This is where a new roundabout would also be added.
NEW PALESTINE — Plans to build a roundabout near the entrance of the Community School Corporation of Southern Hancock administrative offices were discussed by county and district officials this week as a deadline to submit the project with the state closed in.
County engineer Gary Pool noted the Stinemyer Road project which will connect a couple of roads on the south side of the county with roundabouts at each end, will help take traffic off of U.S. 52. But, county officials need about a quarter acre of the school district’s land in order to add the roundabout on the east end.
In March, county officials approached superintendent Lisa Lantrip and asked if they could purchase part of a parcel of district land to build a roundabout on the east end of the connector road between CR 550W and CR South 500W (Gem Road) instead of a four-way stop that district officials wanted.
“This is a federally aided project,” Pool said. “That means that the feds will pay 80% of it, so we normally want to take advantage of something like that and when we first put this project together, we put roundabouts at both ends.”
That’s something district officials were a little hesitant about due to the fact construction would close down a main entrance to the campus. The roundabout would have four entrance and exit points: Stinemyer Road to the west (the new connector road); School Street leading onto campus for New Palestine High School, New Palestine Elementary and the district administration offices to the east; CR 500W going north; and CR 500W going south.
Plans for the roundabout were to be submitted to the Indiana Department of Transportation by Oct. 6 in order for the state to pick up 80% of the cost and for the work to get done in 2025. Any delay would push the project back until 2026 and possibly take the roundabout near the school campus out.
“I’ll let INDOT (Indiana Department of Transportation) know here in a couple of days if this project is going to stay in the same schedule or not,” Pool said earlier this week. “If I can get a memo from the district’s school board saying they are not going to fight us, we’ll get this in in 2025.”
District officials have winced some at the idea of the roundabout installation near their district offices, saying they don’t want that entrance to the New Palestine High School campus shut down for any length of time.
Still, Pool and county commissioner Bill Spalding worked this week to get all the proper paperwork from the school board added to Pool’s plans so they could push the project through to avoid delays.
“If we have to end up putting in a four-way stop there, eventually the school district is going to have to come up with the money, about $1 million, to add the roundabout later because they are going to have traffic issues there,” Pool said. “Right now, they’d have to pay zero dollars.”
Pool said, when they started looking at the deeds for some of the district land, officials found some of the deeds were not up to date with some property chains showing deeds sat with a bank and not the district.
“The ownership of the property located where we need didn’t show a clear chain of who owns the land,” Pool said. “Obviously, it’s the district’s property and that part will get cleaned up, but it doesn’t help as we’re trying to get everything ironed out now.”
Spalding and New Palestine Town Council Secretary Bill Niemier, who are both in favor of the roundabout, went to the recent board meeting and told the board they had not heard back from district officials following their March proposal about the roundabout and wondered where things stood with a submission deadline looming.
Pool says adding a roundabout rather than a four-way stop where the new connector road is to be installed is just a better, safer idea.
“What I’ve done is asked our people to put plans for the roundabout in, but what I don’t know for certain is what year it will be due to the late nature of the district’s decision, unless the school board says ‘we’re down with the roundabout,’” Pool said. “It will make that area safer, and it’s what we’ve wanted to do from the start, but we took it out when district officials said they didn’t want it for whatever reason.”
Southern Hancock Community Relations Director Craig Smith noted they too want the roundabout, but shutting down a major entrance and exit to the campus has caused the pause — that and figuring out the actual land deeds.
“We want to make certain that the campus and its entrances can be kept open during its construction,” Smith said in an email to the Daily Reporter.
Smith went on to say that district officials shared with county officials back in March that they would work with their attorney in reference to the land that is needed for the construction of the roundabout.
“It is a title issue that must be cleared up prior to moving forward,” Smith said. “We are still working through that process and, as promised, we will communicate with Mr. (Gary) Pool once that process is complete.”
District officials noted they want to see that Gem Road entrance to campus remain open somehow during construction, and they also want to see a stoplight put in on Bittner Road and U.S. 52 as part of the deal.
“My office does have the option to force this roundabout, but we don’t want to do that,” Pool said. “What we want to know is does the school board want this or not?”
Final details of the project were expected to be ironed out between attorneys late this week.
A connector road between CR 550W and CR South 500W (Gem Road) is expected to be built as soon as 2025. There are still questions about if a roundabout will be added at the end of the project onto the Southern Hancock campus.
