By Steven Spencer
Calhoun County Engineer Kyle Godar provided an update to county commissioners at their June 2 meeting about transmission line updates by Ameren.
Ameren is looking for approval for the county’s floodplain permit to move forward with transmission line updates.
Some of the issues surrounding the project are the different access points and potential damage that could be sustained to county-maintained roads.
Godar told the commissioners that according to their maps, there are approximately 130 access points that will be used by Ameren. His concern is trucks going off the road and breaking the asphalt on the edge of the roads which will make its way to the drive lanes.
“I’m not here to stop their project. I’m just here to protect our roads, make sure that they’re going to fix any damage properly and that they’re not doing something that’s going to present an unsafe conditions for traveling,” Godar said.
Although the project will involve utilizing private property and agreements with the landowners, county roads will have to be used for access.
“It seems like there might be some holes in their plan, and then they’re going to need to call an audible and put in road accesses where they don’t call it road accesses,” Commissioner Hayden Sievers said.
Commissioner Deann Fester and Godar agreed that the public needed to be made aware and have access to the maps.
“I think at a minimum we make their list of what they say they’re doing with the landowners publicly available,” Godar said.
Godar said he would like to have the maps easily accessible to the public on the county’s website, and said he’d be working to have a road use agreement ready for the next meeting.
