CLEARFIELD -- A group of Clearfield residents are concerned about what a $70 million road project will mean for their neighborhood.
An extension of State Road 193 is set to begin in early 2011, but before it does, residents who will be affected by the project, living near Thorstead Park, want their voices to be heard.
As part of the project, Utah Department of Transportation will construct approximately three miles of east-west transportation capacity improvements in northern Davis County.
The state plans to extend SR 193, also known as Bernard Fisher Highway, farther west of the freeway to provide additional mobility as an east/west corridor between West Point, Clearfield, Syracuse and Interstate 15.
The planned extension is a new five-lane roadway, south of 200 South, beginning at 2000 West, with a grade-separated crossing over the FrontRunner and Union Pacific rail lines.
After construction on the project is complete, 200 South will function as a residential access road.
"When this project is complete, it will basically create a frontage road right in front of our neighborhood," said Dan Wood, who lives in the neighborhood just north of Thorstead Park, 200 S. 350 West.
The Clearfield residents are fearful the new extension and access road will lower their property values, increase traffic volume in their quiet neighborhood and make things dangerous for children playing in the park.
UDOT officials say the extension of SR 193 will provide additional mobility within West Point, Clearfield and Syracuse that will result in reduced impacts on the community when compared with widening other east-west roadways.
The group circulated a petition, claiming to have knocked on 48 doors in the neighborhood and received 48 signatures.
They met with the Clearfield City Council on Tuesday night.
The group offered to Clearfield and UDOT officials five options for the extension, but those proposals were ultimately rejected.
"Unfortunately, none of their alternatives met UDOT's standards for traffic flow or distance from the railroad," said Mayor Don Wood.
Dan Wood said the mayor (no relation) helped ease some concerns, but the group still hopes more changes can be made.
"We feel like the mayor helped us quite a bit and the city will do some things that will help," Dan Wood said. "But we just want our concerns to be out there publicly, and maybe something good will come out of it."
Mayor Wood said the city hopes to put a fence around the park, install new crosswalks and aggressively enforce the speed limit in the area.
"We agreed to use some limited resources to help mitigate some of their concerns," Mayor Wood said.
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