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Road work may quell dust storms on shortcut
By SAUNDRA AMRHEIN, Times Staff Writer Even as the temperature climbs to the 90s, Altamont Lane in Land O'Lakes looks like a winter wonderland. White flecks cake the trees and ground. Flurries obscure headlights of passing cars. Yet the residents are less than festive. The "snow" is dust from the lime rock road, something many of them have been fighting to change for more than five years. Now there might be a solution at the endof their chalky tunnel. Not only might Altamont become a paved road, easing the dust problems for residents, but commuters in fast-growing central Pasco will get a smoother shortcut to Hillsborough County. "This was a dirt road, and it's turned into a dirt highway," Commissioner Pat Mulieri said. The County Commission on Tuesday night agreed to build up and pave Altamont Lane after a developer offered to kick in $50,000. The condition is that Altamont residents, including Jeff Gallagher who outlined the road's safety problems for the commission, must persuade a handful of their neighbors to give the county parts of the street they own, or right of way. In exchange, the county would pave the road for free after declaring it a major thoroughfare, or collector road. The three-quarter mile stretch of lime rock road is the only direct connection between State Road 54 and County Line Road between U.S. 41 and Gunn Highway. The other alternative is paying a toll on the Suncoast Parkway. At the county line, Altamont becomes Angel Lane and hits Lutz Lake Fern Road. "I can't see any reason why this can't be a collector road," Commission Chairwoman Ann Hildebrand said during the meeting, pleasing residents who came to complain. Residents worry about the road's lack of speed controls and turn lanes, not to mention the dust storms. Children waiting for school buses are blocked from view once a vehicle passes and kicks up a load of dust, Dan Dunn said Wednesday. Dunn, with Dunn & Polo Enterprises, is the developer who told the commission he'll give $50,000 toward paving the road. He's building 56 homes on about 62 acres in a community to be called Grey Hawk at Lake Polo. The homes will run between $300,000 and $550,000. While it's a condition of his development to pave the road in front of his property, Dunn said that would have cost him $25,000. He's contributing twice that. The county's cost to build up and pave the road will be about $100,000 to $150,000, County Administrator John Gallagher said. Hildebrand said the job would probably increase traffic on Altamont. But at least the residents will not have to pay for the benefit of commuters. "They were sitting back there thinking, 'Why should we have to do anything when most of the traffic isn't our traffic?' " Hildebrand said.
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From today's Pasco Times |
