Town’s early traffic warning

Motorists traveling along Turkey Creek, Virtue and Boyd Station roads could expect some road closures starting in February.

Knoxville Utilities Board is planning to make improvements to its gas system on a number of roads, among them Turkey Creek and Virtue roads and Boyd Station. Farragut Municipal Planning Commission voted to approve KUB’s plan during FMPC’s meeting Thursday, Nov. 15.

“A lot of this project is not in the Town of Farragut,” Community Development director Mark Shipley said. “It’s basically gas line upgrades in the southwest part of the Town and the Choto area outside of the Town.

“They are tying in to an 8-inch gas line on Turkey Creek Road, near the western part of Brixworth,” Shipley said.

“We hope to go into construction early next year — probably February is when we’ll start,” said Seth Fischer, engineer with Cannon & Cannon Inc. “It’s about a six- to eight-month project, and probably a little over half of that is in the Town limits.”

“They’ll be going west under the inlet and then on the north side of Boyd Station Road, all the way up to the access into the western part of Willow Cove and going under the railroad tracks there to service Willow Cove subdivision and properties to the west in the Choto area,” Shipley said.

“There’s also a minor tie-in improvement on McFee Road, just north of Allen Kirby Road comes into McFee Road,” he added.

Concerning impacts to the Town, he said, “There could be some partial, temporary road closures or lane closures on Turkey Creek Road, at Boyd Station Road and potentially the greenway along Turkey Creek Road could be temporarily closed for safety reasons.”

“The road closures would be, like, a day at any given location,” Fischer said.

Rita Holladay, FMPC chairwoman, asked about disruptions along the walking trail.

“We won’t actually be crossing the walking trails in front of Brixworth,” Fischer said. “We’re going to be within a few feet of it with the equipment. Any closure would be just to maintain separation.”

He said there would not be any breaking up of concrete.