MOUNT VERNON — The Mount Vernon City Council purchased 200 Mansfield Ave. on Monday night during its legislative session with plans to alleviate a “dog leg” that has caused traffic issues in that section.
Council voted to suspend the rules requiring multiple readings and unanimously voted in favor of the resolution.
“This is a problem in our section that we have been enduring for a long time, and we’re talking about Old Mansfield Road, Fairgrounds Road and Clinton Road,” Mayor Matt Starr said.
“There is a major dog leg there that has bottlenecked traffic and forced cut-through traffic on Fearn and Pearl [Avenues] in particular.”
Starr said when the City studied comprehensive transportation planning, “this area lit up like a Christmas tree, and stakeholders said, ‘you need to do whatever you can to fix this.'”
By purchasing this property, the City will now enter the planning phase to make the intersection a crossroads instead of the current dog leg.
“It is also within our new zoning code that we do not allow dog legs,” Starr added.
Councilman Mel Severns recently walked the area on the new multi-use path the City recently constructed.
“You actually have to cross Clinton and then cross Mansfield to stay on it [the multi-use path]. This would alleviate that,” Severns said. “You would only have to cross one time to stay on the multi-use path.”
Severns and Starr agreed that a new design for the intersection would also be safer for pedestrians.
Starr noted nothing would happen overnight, but owning the property allows for proper planning and indicated Knox County would be happy to help with this project as well.