State Department of Transportation (DOT) officials this week described plans to relocate the northern intersection of Pecks Lane and South Main Street (Route 25) to simplify a confusing junction, improve traffic flow, and reduce motor vehicle accidents.

About a dozen members of the public, mostly people living near the intersection, attended an August 16 DOT informational session on the $2.2 million intersection project, construction of which is expected to start in spring 2018.

Residents asked whether the project plans include any traffic signal. DOT officials responded that no traffic signal is required for the road improvements.

The long junction in a commercial/residential area is at the point where South Main Street, Pecks Lane, Prospect Drive, and Cedar Hill Road meet. The heavily-traveled intersection has been the scene of many rear-end collisions, in which southbound motorists on South Main Street strike the rear end of other southbound motorists' vehicles that are waiting to make left turns onto Pecks Lane or onto the adjacent Prospect Drive.

DOT Project Engineer Salvatore Aresco said that design planning for the improvements is about 30 percent complete.

Planned changes include moving the intersection of Pecks Lane and South Main Street about 250 feet to the south. In the new configuration, both sides of Pecks Lane will be flared to provide sufficient space for vehicle-turning motions where the two roads meet.

The improvement project will affect an about 775-foot-long section of South Main Street. The project will include extending an existing southbound bypass lane on South Main Street southward from South Main Street's intersection with Cedar Hill Road to the new intersection of South Main Street and Pecks Lane.

Such an extended bypass lane would provide sufficient space for southbound motorists to pass, on the right, other southbound motorists who are waiting to make left turns either onto Prospect Drive or onto Pecks Lane at the planned new intersection.

Also, an existing tall stone wall that stands on the west side of South Main Street, just south of its intersection with Cedar Hill Road, would be removed to improve sight lines for motorists entering South Main Street from Cedar Hill Road. An embankment near that wall also would be cut back to improve the view.

During construction, the DOT plans to maintain two-way traffic on South Main Street during peak traffic periods. When detours are required, traffic would be rerouted to the southern intersection of South Main Street and Pecks Lane, which lies about 5,000 feet to the south.

The intersection improvement project has been in the planning stages for many years.