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This week Norfolk & Southern will issue a bulletin to their engineers signaling the establishment of the quiet zone. At 12:01 AM on New Year’s Eve it will finally become official, as the Twinsburg Road crossing becomes a quiet zone. On December 10th, Mayor Don Kuchta started the clock ticking on the 21 day waiting period when he filed the paperwork with the PUCO, FRA, ORDC and Norfolk & Southern Railroad to officially establish the quiet zone.

All work necessary to qualify the Twinsburg Road crossing for a quiet zone was finished by early November, but the final cost will not be known until sometime early next year. We were awarded $168,323 in stimulus funds for the project, $136,253 of which was earmarked for Norfolk & Southern crossing circuitry upgrades. Norfolk & Southern budgeted 19 work days for the project, but completed their work in approximately 10 days. We budgeted $32,070 for the median dividers, engineering and miscellaneous other work Macedonia was responsible to complete. The total cost associated with Macedonia’s portion of the project was approximately $24,000. The projected final cost of the quiet zone project should come in between $146,500 - $150,000.

I would like to thank all those who have worked together to make this possible. Within 3 years we completed a project we thought couldn’t be done with 3 times the budget. Happy New Year!

This week Norfolk & Southern finished replacing the warning gates and upgrading the circuitry necessary for the Twinsburg Rd rail crossing quiet zone. And last night A & A Safety, a contractor for Macedonia, completed installation of the Qwick Kurb median dividers on the east side of the crossing, completing the final phase of construction on our project!

Now that all work necessary to qualify the Twinsburg Road crossing for a quiet zone is finished, it’s just a matter of completing a couple of administrative steps to declare the Twinsburg Road railroad crossing a quiet zone. We initiated step 1 last week when we submitted paperwork to Norfolk & Southern, the FRA, PUCO and the ORDC for comment. The comment period can last up to 60 days. After the comment period has concluded, Mayor Kuchta will submit a quiet zone declaration. The Mayor’s declaration will take effect 21 days after issuance. We hope to complete the process by New Years Eve 2010.

The goal line is now within sight, and we wouldn’t be here had it not been for the help of many people. I would especially like to thank Jimmy Conway, Deb Young, Bob Suva and Walter Carson for their dedication and support in helping to make the quiet zone a reality.