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Prineville's Roundabout Opens Friday

PRINEVILLE, OR -- After delaying one more day, the Oregon Department of Transportation plans to open Prineville’s first roundabout Friday morning. ODOT’s Peter Murphy says unforeseen circumstances forced crews to back off plans to open it Thursday, as they finished connecting the roundabout at Tom McCall Road to Highway 126. "That means doing some paving and removing some asphalt, I mean there’s a lot of detail work that takes place at this time in a project, and we want to make sure it’s safe and proper and all that. It just took a little bit more work than we thought it would, to make that happen."
 
He says it’s going to take time for drivers to get used to the new traffic pattern, "Even though we have roundabouts popping up more often, there aren’t so many on state highways and certainly out in the Prineville area where this is the first. It’s going to take a little learning to make sure we’re going the right direction, doing the right turning movements. But, a little bit of extra time to learn how a roundabout works and we’re all going to be in a good place."
 
Murphy tells KBND News just because the roundabout is opening doesn’t mean work is done, "As these projects go, they’re done in stages. So, at this stage we need to move the traffic on to the roundabout and then there will be other kinds of activities that take place, among which is landscaping and that kind of thing." He says construction crews will work on those finishing touches through the summer.
 

 

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