A firm date for the reopening of Highway 47 remains elusive, an Oregon Department of Transportation spokesperson told the Banks Post on Monday.
“We’re getting closer to being able to estimate a new reopening date. We’re still waiting to hear back from one specialty subcontractor who mobilizes from Utah at this time,” said David House, a Region 2 ODOT spokesperson.
“The utility relocations were completed last week, giving us a clear path forward to opening the road,” House said, but he could not supply a firm date on Monday, promising that ODOT would share the new reopening date when it became available.
House said that ODOT issued notices to the utility companies with equipment in the work area in the fall of 2021 and gave them until April 2022 to move their poles and lines that have halted construction work.
The project had originally been scheduled to wrap up by October.
“The wet spring of 2022 delayed their ability to do the work,” House said of the utility companies.
Chas Hundley is the editor of the Banks Post and sister news publications the Gales Creek Journal and the Salmonberry Magazine. He grew up in Gales Creek and has a cat.
