Harris Road is usually busy in the morning and evening hours, a shortcut between Rucker Road to the west corners of Alpharetta and Highway 9. This week things are going to be even messier, as this morning the road resurfacing crew came in to start work.
The road wasn’t in horrible condition, but it was bad enough — there were several potholes that needed repair and were getting larger each day. I’d even considered going out and marking them with traffic paint then calling the city management office, but before I got around to it the “road work next week” signs went up.
Traffic is of course down to one lane, and the road is long and curved enough that the sign guys can’t see each other. Apparently they don’t have radios, so there’s a pickup that leads traffic one way, then turns around and leads the next set back. As you can imagine, it’s not the most efficient operation. Combine that with the mess of dug-up road parts, tar and dust, and it’s certainly a road you’d rather avoid.
From what I understand, Rucker Road itself is also going to be getting some work done this week or next, so traffic in the whole area’s going be be interesting for a while. If you have alternate routes, this would be a good time to use them.
While on vacation in Wyoming last my route took me through some mountains with road construction. This was a 5-year construction project and was about 5 miles long. Even though the Flaggers had radio they also had a “Follow Me” truck that did just as yours did – drove both ways with a caravan of cars following. The radios seemed to just help tell what the end of the caravan was like, and to tell when the “Greenies” were comming. The Greenies were Big, no Huge, no Gigantic dump trucks that were hauling the big, hugh, gigantic rocks that were being removed to make way for the new road.