New Oakwood road opens Tuesday

OAKWOOD - The state Department of Transportation is poised to open a new road in Oakwood Tuesday.

A section of Thurmon Tanner Parkway between Atlanta Highway and Mundy Mill Road is set to open at mid-morning.

The new four-lane crosses the Gainesville State College/Lanier Technical College campus, creating a new "gateway" to the campus, according to DOT's Teri Pope.

Eventually, the road will be extended across Mundy Mill to Plainview Road.

In addition, Pope said Monday a new park-and-ride lot is almost ready to open at the corner of Atlanta Highway and Thurman Tanner Parkway. It will contain parking spaces for about 600 vehicles - triple the number the lot at Mundy Mill and I-985 can handle. Pope says the new park-and-ride should be open in about two weeks. At that time, the other one will close for reconstruction. However, when it reopens, the number of spaces will be the same.

All of this is associated with the mammoth reconstruction of the Exit 16 interchange on I-985 in Oakwood.