City of Zanesville in process of designing fix for a road that’s been closed for more than a year

ZANESVILLE – Muskingum Avenue – commonly referred to as “Dug Road”, has been closed since February of 2019 after a slip along the north edge of the road.

In a meeting Tuesday night, the City Council passed an emergency measure to authorize the council to contract with an engineering firm so the city can look at finding a resolution to an issue that Mayor Don Mason says has plagued the city for many years.

“What we did is the administration sat down with four engineering firms, reviewed the proposals, and then selected what we thought was the best combination of geotechnical surfaces for hill size as well as road engineering. So, ADR is out of Newark, Ohio (and) they’re partnering with another firm called TerraCom so collectively, those two companies will help create the solution so that we can hopefully go out to bid in 22 weeks from now,” Mason says.

Masons says that working on the road to have it re-open is important for both financial and safety reasons.

“If we ever want to revitalize the Putnam area and the area of Pine and West Main Street, then we need to have the inner-connector here for safety purposes, we need to have the inner-connector so emergency vehicles can go to and from the south end and based off their location,” Mason said.

Right now, the goal is to have construction of the project begin in 2021 so the road can be used as an alternate route when roadwork begins on Interstate 70 next year.