30 minutes with Mayor McCamy

Clarion Top News

Wednesday, 07 June 2023 10:55

Scottsboro City Mayor Jim McCamy was available to update The Clarion on several projects going on in the city. The County Park Road and Highway 72 Safety Project is well underway, with the turning lanes in the center median now complete. Work has now begun on the crossover in the middle of the intersection.

Mayor McCamy stated, “Expected completion for this project is mid-summer. They haven’t given that to us as a firm date, but that’s what we’re looking at. Please continue to be patient because it will be better once they’re completed with it. I know the detours are a challenge, but it’s part of it. When it’s done, it will be safer and more functional than it is now. This is something we’ve needed to have done for a long time. Our traffic has increased, and that compounds the issue, but with the already-increasing traffic, it’s something that has got to be done. It’s a difficult intersection to do a lot with, and our hope is that ALDOT’s design will alleviate the wait time to get through the intersection with the way the lights will be synced up.”

The mayor stated the Whataburger is moving along and should be getting reasonably close to opening in the next month or so. Chick-fil-A has some of the framing up already, and is still looking at a late August, early September timeframe for its opening.

“The developer is doing the Chick-fil-A, and Scottsboro will be doing the intersection. We’ve got two parts to this project,” the mayor stated. “The intersection is going to be changed, and the lights will be changed and re-synced. It will be very similar to the intersection of Hwy. 72 and County Park Road when it’s completed. The turning radius will be severely modified where you turn in to go to Chick-fil-A, and there will be turn lanes and straight lanes coming across from both sides of the frontage road. It will be a significant improvement to that intersection.”

The mayor also stated that the improvements to the intersection will be significant when considering the traffic load that will be picked up because of the new Chick-fil-A. The other part of the project is the city’s rehab of Micah Way. Considered inefficient and hazardous, Micah Way will be rehabbed in a project that has already gone out for bid. It will cover from Chick-fil-A all the way past the curve. The last three weeks, the city has been installing new drainage structures, and those should be completed already this week. The city will then begin looking at the rehab.

Micah Way’s extension to Byron Road is awaiting project approval from ALDOT, as part of this falls onto the state’s right-of-way. Once the plans are approved, the city will go to bid for this project and hopefully get it started soon.

The ultimate goal for the city is to have the frontage road run parallel all the way down Hwy. 72. The city is also in the process to extend the road beside Whataburger all the way down to Sarah Betty Lane, which will go right past Dunham’s. While only in the beginning stages of planning for this improvement, the city hopes to have this underway soon, as well.

The Water, Sewer and Gas Board’s water project with the installation of the 16-inch water mains, funded by American Rescue Plan Act funds, will extend from Hwy. 35 to Hwy. 72. This project is almost complete along Crawford Road. More work must be done on George Adams, but once they get through with Crawford, resurfacing will be able to begin as the project has already been bid. This resurfacing will cover Crawford from Hwy. 35, all the way to Snodgrass behind the high school.

Residents are reminded to be patient, knowing it will be well worth the headache now once it’s completed.

“Part of our budget process is we always go through and look at the projects like these – what we’ve planned and what we’ve been able to accomplish,” Mayor McCamy stated. “I looked back over the last two and a half years with some of these projects that we have completed or are in the process of completing, and in the last two and half years, we have resurfaced almost six miles of city streets.”

The mayor continued, “When you look at the new projects like Whataburger and Chick-fil-A, coupled with Shops of Scottsboro, that equates to over 450 new retail jobs that have come in for Scottsboro and Jackson County. I think that’s significant.”

“When I looked at that and the calendar and where we are at this point, I thought, well, I’d like to see some of this get completed. There are also other things I would like to get started and see completed – whether it’s cleaning up certain areas in town, or actually all of Scottsboro, and improving the appearance and looking at new industrial opportunities as well as our streets. We have a lot of streets that need to be resurfaced. These projects, I want to get them started, and I want to get them done. That being said, I will be seeking re-election next year. Qualifying is in June of next year, and I will be seeking election for a second term in 2024.”

by Martha Smith