Georgia Department of Transportation (DOT) contractors have begun construction on a project aimed at saving lives at what some Jefferson County emergency responders say is by far the deadliest single intersection in the area.

Dave Beachy, chief of the nearby Hillcrest Fire Department, said that he has begun to loathe the tone for a motor vehicle accident, saying he feels far too many are at the intersection of State Route 296 and Highway 88, also known as the Fall Line Freeway.

“When they drop the tone you just know it’s going to be at that intersection,” Beachy said. “It seems like we’re averaging one there every two or three weeks and we have had two in one day there. And we have had as many as five fatalities in one vehicle.”

On Monday, June 17, Georgia DOT contractors began construction of a Reduced Conflict U-Turn (RCUT) design that will force drivers using Hwy. 296 to cross the Fall Line Freeway in a completely new way.

According to Will Volk, a District 2 Communications officer for GDOT, the new design will prevent vehicles traveling both north and south along State Route 296 from going straight across the intersection or from crossing two lanes of oncoming traffic to turn immediately left onto the Fall Line Freeway. Instead, all vehicles coming to this intersection from Hwy. 296 will have to turn right onto the freeway and have an opportunity to make a U-turn a short distance away. Vehicles traveling east and west along Hwy 88/the Fall Line Freeway, will be able to use a new concrete median to turn either north or south onto Hwy 296.

“There is a Federal Highway Administration study that said they (RCUT designs) reduce severe crashes in intersections like this by more than 50 percent,” Volk said. “Basically, you’re cutting off a lot of conflict points here, by restricting traffic on 296 from going straight or left. That reduces the number of types of angle collisions you can have there.”

Volk added that contractors have already begun adding “extra padding” that will allow larger and longer vehicles to be able to make the Uturns.

Drivers in this area have been notified to expect temporary lane closures near the intersection over the next several weeks as construction is anticipated to continue until August. The project will also include the construction of concrete medians, signage and pavement markings.

Volk went on to explain that the RCUT is a temporary solution, as DOT plans to follow the recommendation of a recent traffic safety study on this intersection that suggests a roundabout as the long-term solution. Plans for the roundabout are still in the pre-construction phase, Volk said, with work estimated to begin on that project in 2027.

“The roundabout is the ultimate solution,” Volk said. “This is just an interim, quick response. If you go further down the Fall Line Freeway, there’s one (a roundabout) that was recently installed at State Route 540 and State Route 24 in Washington County. The roundabout will be the ultimate solution, but RCUTs are proven to work in the interim.”

In past years DOT has added rumble strips, yield signs, stop ahead signs and flashing lights leading up to the intersection. And yet, collisions continue to occur there.

“That intersection has a very long history of fatalities and lives matter,” Beachy said. “These deaths need to stop. And not only the deaths. There are wrecks that happen and lives are ruined. There was a wreck where five siblings were in the vehicle, one died, one was air lifted, two others went by ambulance. It has messed that family up. It just needs to stop.”

Keith Boulineau, Wrens Fire Chief, said that his department is dispatched to nearly every major motor vehicle accident at that intersection to provide support and often, to cut away the twisted metal trapping people in their wrecked vehicles.

According to Boulineau’s records, Wrens firefighters have responded to 34 calls at this intersection in the last seven years.

“Right off the top of my head I can think of six people who have passed away at that intersection,” Boulineau said.

He worries about complications that may come from the way drivers negotiate the RCUT changes.

“I think you are going to see people on 296 who try to weave their way through the intersection. And when you have these big log trucks that are going to have to try to make that Uturn, they’re going to swing wide and they’re going to take up every lane,” Boulineau said.

He added that while drivers on the freeway are often driving too fast, he believes the problem in more with drivers on Hwy 296 attempting to cross.

Beachy summed up the feelings of a number of local residents who have expressed concerns online that the RCUT design may not be enough, soon enough.

“I feel like they should go ahead and put the roundabout in instead of doing this,” Beachy said. “They put down rumble strips and then they put in lights and then they added stop signs and yield signs. To me, it’s like they’re giving a crying baby pacifiers instead of going ahead and feeding the baby, instead of doing what needs to be done. This mess has been going on for eight years.”

This article originally appeared on Augusta Chronicle: Construction begins at deadly Jefferson County intersection