Officials broke ground Wednesday morning on a $12.4 million project to change the landscape of Ohiopyle State Park and the borough it surrounds.
Plum Contracting Inc. of Greensburg will rehabilitate the bridge over the Youghiogheny River at the borough’s entrance, rebuild and shift parking lots across from the visitor center and install a pedestrian tunnel under Route 381 to improve safety for rafters and kayakers heading to the white-water rapids at the popular recreation area.
Leslie S. Richards, secretary of the state Department of Transportation, and Cindy Adams Dunn, secretary of the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, led a group of officials at the ceremonial beginning of the joint project.
Although the project has been met with skepticism from some local residents, the state said it is important to improve safety for the 1.5 million people who visit the park every year. The changes, which also will include relocating bicycle trails away from the highway, are designed to eliminate dozens of near-miss accidents with vehicles and pedestrians, officials say.
Work on the two-year project will be done between November and Memorial Day 2019 and September and Memorial Day 2020 so it won’t interfere with the busiest times at the park.
This season, Plum will do one half of the bridge work; reconfigure the parking lots; relocate Sugarloaf Road to move it closer to rental shops; install the pedestrian tunnel; add speed bumps on Route 381; and redesign intersections with local streets to make crosswalks more prominent and safer.
Work in the second season will include finishing the bridge, relocating bike lanes onto park property in front of the visitors center and building a new bathhouse where boaters can change clothes.
Ed Blazina: eblazina@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1470 or on Twitter @EdBlazina.
First Published: November 28, 2018, 5:31 p.m.
