By DAN POMPILI

Staff writer

AUSTINTOWN — A state plan to demolish a local bridge has city officials concerned about public safety.

Trustee Robert Santos said township administrators oppose ODOT’s proposed demolition of the Lanterman Road bridge over Interstate 680 in the northeast corner of the township because it will increase emergency response time.

“Fire and police are against it, and so is the whole board. It’s definitely going to be detrimental to the municipality and the safety of our residents,” he said. “They’ve taken the humanity out of everything. This is completely wrong, and I hope they would work with us to find a sensible solution.”

Santos said the plan was originally proposed in 2019, but he suspects it was shelved along with many other projects during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Santos became aware of it when he ran for office in 2021, he said, and trustees recently became aware of ODOT’s plans to revive the project.

Fire Chief David Schertzer and Police Chief Robert Gavalier echoed Santos’ concerns. When the plan was first proposed in 2019, Scherzter said, then-Fire Chief Andy Frost attended a public meeting to support residents’ fears about safety response times.

Schertzer and Gavalier said they ran their own time trial because they weren’t willing to just accept ODOT’s assessment.

The main detour, in the event of the bridge’s demolition, would take traffic along Raccoon Road onto Crum Road, to Meridian Road, then up to Lanterman Road.

When they drove a truck from Station 2 at Wickliffe Circle — the closest station to the Lanterman Road neighborhood — and took the custom route suggested by ODOT, they found it would add 3:22 to their response to the nearest house on the side of Lanterman who would be cut off.

Santos said the standard response time would increase from 4:31 to 7:53.

Schertzer and newly appointed Fire Capt. Brandon Wirtz, who leads the department’s EMS operations, said even seconds count and 3.5 minutes can be catastrophic.

“The general rule of thumb used to be that a fire doubles in size every minute,” Schertzer said. “But now it’s more like 30 seconds.”

He said it’s because of the different types of materials found in homes today compared to what was found in homes built during and before the 1980s.

Wirtz said EMS response isn’t just about getting to a stroke or heart attack patient, or even someone with a severed artery, in time to stop tissue or brain damage or stop bleeding.

“The faster we get things diagnosed, the faster they can activate resources in the hospital,” he said. “The hospital has so much more time to mobilize and that’s compounded and leads to much better patient outcomes. Our goal is less than an hour from the onset of symptoms until definitive care is given. Those minutes really add up across the whole process.”

Gavalier said time is also of the essence in law enforcement.

“If it’s a burglary in progress, we want to be there as soon as possible to try and catch them in the process, and with a domestic, those situations can turn ugly really quickly,” he said. “It’s about getting there in time to stop the crime from happening or to catch the perpetrators.”

He said it also jeopardizes the safety of officers at a location who may need backup quickly.

“If there is no bridge, it makes it much worse. It will be a disadvantage for our officers,” he said.

Santos said he spoke with ODOT District 4 Environmental Specialist Sean Carpenter last week and was frustrated by the conversation.

He said Carpenter told him — reflected in ODOT’s assessment — that response times would only lag by two minutes.

“It’s just a little concerning, when you read the assessment, I understand they have to save money, but when it comes to the safety and the lives of our residents, it’s something we have to invest in,” he said. “It’s not as simple as taking an extra two to three minutes to pick up a liter of milk.”

Santos added that in addition to the safety concerns, residents’ home insurance will likely increase due to the backlog in emergency response time.

He also said that once the project is complete, care of Lanterman Road – and all related costs – would fall to the parish.

He said he told Carpenter that trustees wanted to meet with ODOT about the project but Carpenter declined, at least for now.

WHY TEAR IT UP?

The assessment from ODOT shows that the bridge, built in 1967, was scheduled to be resurfaced.

“However, upon further analysis, the steel superstructure was found to fail both in terms of capacity and moment capacity,” the report states. “Because the current structure is failing completely over the center piers, along with the condition of the protective coating system … it will likely be more cost effective to replace the entire superstructure.”

The report shows ODOT’s estimate of just over $2 million to replace the structure and $4.2 million to replace and maintain it over its lifetime.

However, it will cost about $450,000 to remove the bridge and install dead ends at the separation points in those neighborhoods.

District 4 spokesman Ray Marsch said cost is definitely a factor, but ODOT has considered other aspects.

“The bridge … is nearing the end of its useful life. There are less than 400 vehicles traveling on this road each day,” he said. “There are several other options to cross I-680 in this area.”

As for Santos’ concerns about communication, Marsch said “ODOT has had and will continue to have ongoing conversations with Austintown Township about this project.”

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