County engineer talks of possible Refugee Road/Pickerington Road roundabout in the future

LANCASTER − Could a roundabout be the solution to navigating the heavy traffic at the Refugee Road/Pickerington Road intersection in Pickerington?

Maybe.

That's one of the ideas Fairfield County Engineer Jerimiah Upp talked about Tuesday at the county commissioner's weekly meeting. The county has been studying ways to deal with the traffic there for several years, and a possible roundabout has been a subject of the studies.

Commissioner Jeff Fix spoke of the need for improvements at the intersection and nearby area, including adding some sidewalks.

"I travel that section of the road every day and it's a challenge," he said. "There are two things that I was most concerned about when we were having these conversations back a couple years ago. One was the kids that have to walk to Pickerington North High School. There's a lot of sections of Refugee Road that don't have any sidewalks at all."

Fix's second concern was the expected growth around that area and Intel's planned arrival about 25 minutes to the north.

In other commission news:

• The commissioners honored Allison Bolinger, a Lancaster native and flight director for NASA in Houston. Her father is county treasurer Jim Bahnsen. One of the more famous NASA flight directors is Gene Kranz, who led Apollo 13's return to Earth in 1970 after an in-flight explosion. Ed Harris played his part in the movie "Apollo 13" in 1995.

jbarron@gannett.com

740-681-4340

Twitter/X: @JeffDBarron

This article originally appeared on Lancaster Eagle-Gazette: Engineer talks of possible Refugee Road/Pickerington Road roundabout