Staff photo / R. Michael Semple Traffic is maintained as construction continues at the intersection of state Route 46 and East Market Street in Howland Corners. Here, westbound traffic along East Market heads into the Route 46 intersection Tuesday afternoon. Starting Monday, traffic on Route 46 southbound will not be able to turn onto East Market Street eastbound and traffic on Route 46 northbound will not be able to turn onto East Market Street westbound. Also, traffic on East Market Street westbound will not be able to turn left onto Route 46 southbound. The road adjustments are in effect through late October.

HOWLAND — Yet another round of road work has started in the township, but the changes it brings to the traffic patterns will only last for a few months, according to Ray Marsch, public information officer for the Ohio Department of Transportation District 4.

He said they’re closing some left-turn lanes to widen the road and adding a right-turn lane for southbound state Route 46 to East Market, and a right-turn lane for northbound Route 46 to East Market Street.

“In order to add these turn lanes, we need to have some lane restrictions so we can get in there to work,” Marsch said.

The restrictions, which start Monday and will run through late October, will remove left-hand turns on Route 46 north and south to East Market and left-hand turns to Route 46 from East Market.

The project is safety-driven, Marsch said, referring to a study of the area from 2012 to 2016.

“Between 2012 and 2016, 90 crashes happened at this intersection, and 23 of them resulted in an injury,” Marsch said. “We’re adding these turn lanes to allow traffic to flow through this intersection much more efficiently.”

“It’s going to reduce congestion, and it’s going to, and at the end of the day, it’s going to reduce the amount of crashes that are seen at this intersection here,” he added.

Howland Administrator James Pantalone acknowledged the township had just come out of the diverging diamond intersection program in October, calling it “step one” in reimagining traffic moving through the area.

Pantalone said the new work is “step two.”

“It is being widened to basically accommodate additional traffic loads that have been calculated by the engineers, due to the eventual closing off of Howland Wilson (Road), which will be the next phase of this,” Pantalone said. “This project here will last this construction year of 2026 for Howland Corners; they’ve been widening it or they’ve been moving all of the utilities out of the street into the right-of-ways on either side.

“All water lines, gas lines, sewer lines — are getting moved further away from the road so they can expand the road.”

Pantalone said officials haven’t received any calls from residents thus far, but are doing their best to keep the public up to speed.

“This is an ODOT project; yes, it’s in Howland Township. We partner with them, but it’s really driven by ODOT,” Pantalone said. “We really have some input, we work with our police department, we try to put stuff out, but we’re sharing ODOT information as we get it.”

Pantalone said the construction isn’t affecting emergency services, because a preconstruction meeting was done with the department heads a month prior.

“The contractor assured us emergency services will have access. Even though there’s some closures, they accommodate and make sure emergency services can go through,” Pantalone said. “They can’t have the public travelling through, but EMS and fire — we’ve got three stations for the fire side staffed, and police, they’re out and about 24/7.”

Harmon Andrews, owner of Andrew’s Shopping Center, a business Pantalone deemed the “anchor” of Howland Corners, said foot traffic has been down 35% to 40%.

“It’s definitely slower than it should be — of course, the weather has not been conducive to spring,” Andrews said. “Warm weather helps our business a lot, so we’ll see what happens when it finally warms up.”

Andrews said the business is running a 10% sale on all items in the store to help draw foot traffic regardless, noting that it pays a bit of the tax.

Andrews said he’s considered changing business hours to open Sundays and close Mondays, as a means of beating the construction.

“I’m thinking maybe we do that on Sundays, but you know, when you’ve been closed for 18 years on Sundays, I don’t know that I can get people to change back,” said Andrews, who noted the store used to be open seven days a week when his dad was around.