Updated traffic signals, pedestrian safety upgrades coming to Atherton Street intersections

Drivers on Atherton Street will soon see updated traffic signals and pedestrian safety upgrades due to some leftover funding from a state Department of Transportation project.

Patton Township was recently awarded $441,000 by PennDOT that was left over from the regional signal coordination project. The project was done on the sections of Atherton Street that also included College and Harris townships, but since Patton Township was the head of the project, the leftover funding was awarded to that municipality.

The total amount of money that was given for the initial project was $684,138.

There’s a catch though — according to township manager Amy Farkas, the leftover funding can only be spent on traffic signal-related issues and the money must be spent by June 30.

At the Feb. 28 township meeting, Farkas presented an action plan for the additional dollars.

“It was decided that we would use the money to replace outdated signals throughout the corridor,” Farkas said. “There are a bunch of them and College and Harris townships have identified projects on their own that qualify to get the equipment, but since Patton Township is the project manager, we’re going to get some more stuff out of it.”

The township is looking update traffic lights along the original project corridor and make pedestrian safety upgrades at the intersections of Atherton Street and Hawbaker Industrial Drive and Atherton Street and Colonnade Boulevard, she said.

The grant is also going to be used to study the information gathered from the signal coordination project.

In an email to the CDT, Farkas wrote that the amount left over was expected and that Patton Township was grateful to PennDOT for helping to identify qualifying projects to spend the funding on.

“We are grateful that PennDOT has been so good in helping us to identify additional signal projects that would qualify under this grant,” Farkas wrote. “Traffic signal equipment is ever-evolving technology-wise and is also expensive, so we’re happy to have the opportunity to make upgrades where they are needed.”

An engineering proposal from Jacob’s Engineering was submitted for the intersection projects, which the board approved at last week’s meeting.

Moving forward, the bids for the project will be awarded at March’s township meeting and work on the projects will commence soon after.