The Forrest County Board of Supervisors, Forrest General Hospital and other entities in the vicinity of The University of Southern Mississippi are partnering with the educational facility on an $800,000 project.
The university received a grant to build sidewalks from Hardy Street and Miss. 49 to about 32nd Avenue.
“It’s about an $800,000 project with a 20 percent match that equals about $150,000,” said Board President David Hogan. “We’re proud that Forrest General Hospital has agreed to help with the match. They are interested in making the area more pedestrian friendly and thus, our citizens more healthy. We appreciate Mr. Woodard and the Board of Trustees at Forrest Health for assisting.”
This will be an additional beautification project in the area in addition to the project currently in the works, which extends from the 59/49 intersection south, to almost Cloverleaf Mall. The project is adding trees and other foliage along the corridor.
According to Hogan, additional plants and shrubbery will be planted, the crosswalks and intersections will see improvements and some sidewalks will be installed.
During Monday’s meeting of the board of supervisors, board members heard from county engineer Nick Connolly of Shows, Dearman and Waits in regard to the East Hardy Bridge.
Connolly said they had looked at the design on the bridge and looked at it being built south of the existing bridge downstream.
Connolly said they looked to the north of the existing structure but moving utilities would be fairly expensive. “There’s a natural gas line that apparently feeds half the city of Hattiesburg with all the natural gas,” he said. “That pipeline comes from the Gulf South Pipeline. Moving to the south, looks like it will be a lot better.”
While nothing is set in stone, Connolly said the bridge would have a similar design, noting that the length of the structure is too short for a suspension bridge.
The two-land bridge will have a pedestrian sidewalk. The roadbed will be 40-feet wide, which is the Mississippi Department of Transportation standard, with two 12-foot lanes and an 8-foot shoulder. With the pedestrian sidewalks the bridge will encompass a width of about 50 feet. The two lanes will have barriers between them and Connolly said they could look at lighting the structure.
Board President David Hogan said if the structure was going that far south, then he thought it would need to curve, in his opinion, up to the red light to make it wide and sweeping.
“If you look at the old roadbed, which I’ve done, it looks like it will be snaking in and out. I’d like to see us do more wider sweeps and a straighter road.
Connolly said they could look at taking it all the way up to the red light at Carterville Road within the Petal city limits.
