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Old 06-02-2015, 10:08 PM
 
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I noticed that the Cookeville City Council is supposed to vote Thursday night at its meeting to begin the process to acquire property to build the Bennett Road extension. As I recall, this is supposed to be a four-lane divided highway that will include an exit at Buffalo Valley Road. When the state announced that it was going to build a new exit at Mine Lick Creek Road, it was contingent upon the city building this connector road.

I'm glad to see this finally happen. Talk of building this new interchange started 15 years ago and was finally approved by the state in 2008 when the environmental impact study was completed. Attached is a map of the area. The area in red is where the new 1.6 million square foot Academy Sports distribution center is being built. The area in blue is the Highland Business Park where the new Ficosa plant is being built. The area in black is the new Mine Lick Creek Road interchange. The brown line is where the new road is going to go, more or less, and the white circle is where the Buffalo Valley Road interchange will be.
Attached Thumbnails
New West Cookeville Highway and I-40 exit-bennett-road.png  
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:48 AM
 
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I wonder if any divergence from this plan will be allowed; if I recall correctly, the extension to Hwy 70 is a requirement set forth by the ARC, Appalachian Regional Commission, in some historical project.
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Old 06-03-2015, 09:15 AM
 
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Originally Posted by tragenvol View Post
I wonder if any divergence from this plan will be allowed; if I recall correctly, the extension to Hwy 70 is a requirement set forth by the ARC, Appalachian Regional Commission, in some historical project.
That does sound familiar. I think that this road is supposed to eventually loop all the way around Cookeville and hook up with Hwy 111 just north of Algood. I know there has also been talk of extending this road south of I-40 to the airport in northern White County. I'm attaching a map of what I'm talking about. The yellow line is the road that's supposed to loop around the northern part of Cookeville and end in Algood. The area circled in white is the airport, and the purple line is the road that would extend from the Highlands Business Park/new I-40 interchange to the airport. With nearly 2,000 jobs coming online in the next couple of years in the Highlands Business Park and who knows what else is coming down the pipeline, I can see why the southern extension to the airport is a good idea. It'll also allow people from White County to commute to the Highlands Business Park much more directly.
Attached Thumbnails
New West Cookeville Highway and I-40 exit-loop.png  
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Old 06-04-2015, 09:05 AM
 
Location: South Carolina
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Will the Bennett Road extension be built to Interstate Highway standards?

I would not mind seeing United States Route 70 South from Tennessee State Route 160 north to East Spring Street improved to Interstate Highway standards. An Interstate Highway spur serving Putnam County should not be a bad idea.
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Old 06-14-2015, 04:03 AM
 
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Originally Posted by Carolina Knight View Post
Will the Bennett Road extension be built to Interstate Highway standards?

I would not mind seeing United States Route 70 South from Tennessee State Route 160 north to East Spring Street improved to Interstate Highway standards. An Interstate Highway spur serving Putnam County should not be a bad idea.
I believe it is supposed to be a four lane divided highway with an exit at Buffalo Valley Road. Whether or not it's up to interstate standards is unknown to me. There are all kinds of federal regulations that make building a road to interstate standards much more expensive which is why the loop around Nashville is State Highway 840 and not Interstate 840.

At any rate, in today's H-C is an article about all the road improvements that are going to be taking place around the Academy Sports project, and in the article it said that property acquisition is under way for the Bennett Road extension, and the state is going to accept bids for the new interchange and other area road improvements in July. FINALLY.

I suspect that once the road improvements in the area are made, and with that new interchange, that part of town will be completely different in just a couple of years from now.

Academy area experiences growing pains with construction project
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Old 06-15-2015, 10:56 AM
 
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I was told by a neighbor that there are plans to improve/widen highway 135 south of Ditty road to create a better alternate route to highway 111. This was supposed to be related to the new industrial park. Has anyone heard anything about this?
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Old 06-15-2015, 12:07 PM
 
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I think it was all intended by the ARC plan....which I thought required a 4 lane from I40 to Hwy70.
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Old 06-15-2015, 12:16 PM
 
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Originally Posted by tragenvol View Post
I think it was all intended by the ARC plan....which I thought required a 4 lane from I40 to Hwy70.
I'm pretty sure it does. However, south of I-40 I don't think it has to be four lanes. I think what Don9 is referring to is what I mentioned in my post above with the map. I didn't think that the state was going to get started on this yet, in fact it's not on the TDOT's web page at all. I'm sure this is going to happen eventually, but it's probably a few years away.
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Old 06-15-2015, 01:21 PM
 
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From what I recall, once when perusing the TDOT three-year plan, this project wasn't listed. It was apparently approved, but not listed...perhaps it's a threshold project....
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Old 06-15-2015, 02:11 PM
 
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I wonder if it's Ditty Road itself that will be improved. Looking at a map, Hwy 135 goes quite a ways out of the way, not to mention it cuts right through the middle of Burgess Falls State Park. In addition, I'm pretty sure that conversations that the city and county have had about extending a road into White County were specifically talking about the airport and the need to have a better, more direct route between the airport and the new business park.

Looking at a map I can see that maybe Bennett Road could be extended south to hook up with Ditty Road, then follow Ditty Road until it changes names to South Bunker Hill Road and then to Old Cookeville Highway before ending at Hwy 111 where the state just built a new interchange with Hwy 135.

I'm attaching a map to illustrate what I'm talking about. The red area is the Academy Sports project. The blue area is the Highlands Business Park. The black circle is the Bennett Road/Mine Lick Creek Road interchange at I-40. The white circle is the Upper Cumberland Regional Airport which is jointly owned by Sparta, White County, Cookeville, and Putnam County and is located on the northern edge of White County just outside of Cookeville (Cookeville's city limits go all the way to White County). The yellow line is the current Bennett Road which sort of peters out into the countryside. The green line is roughly where Ditty Road/South Bunker Hill Road/Old Cookeville Road is/are located.

It looks like, from the air at least, Bennet Road could be extended to tie in with Ditty Road. I don't think the "new" (or improved) road needs to be four lanes, but certainly an improved two-lane road or even a three lane road with a continuous center turn lane could be done.

Also, if it's not a state road that's going to be improved, the state wouldn't necessarily be a part in it, and it should go faster. I'm thinking of when Cookeville has built new roads in the past (West Jackson, Neal Street, Interstate Drive) they were completed rather quickly.
Attached Thumbnails
New West Cookeville Highway and I-40 exit-ditty.png  
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