The Coronavirus pandemic has affected seemingly every part of daily life and road construction is no exception.
Local and state transportation crews are continuing to work on road projects while trying to take precautions where possible. Jason Dykes is the Traffic Engineer for the Georgia Department of Transportation's northeast district and he says there are some parts of road work that can't be done while social distancing.
"As an agency, we've initiated all the guidelines that have been recommended by the CDC," Dykes said. "There are some things, though, that we have to do that require our staff to work closely with one another. It's hard to operate some of our machinery with just one person."
Dykes said crews are taking some precautions such as riding vehicles with only one person inside and that has made work a little slower.
On the other hand, traffic has been much lower and Dykes said that could allow some projects to be worked on outside of their normal allotted hours.
"We have gotten several requests in since schools have been closed to be able to work outside of those hours that are set forth in our contracts and we are evaluating those on a case-by-case basis," Dykes said. "We're taking into consideration where the projects are located. Are they located near a hospital or some sort of a distribution center that needs to have good access to the roadway?"
There are several major road construction projects underway in Hall County including the widening of Spout Springs Road and work on number of bridges over Lake Lanier.
Dykes said the lower traffic can lead to some people driving faster. He said it's important to remember to be cautious when driving around road construction.
"We just really want people to be aware, especially while they're in construction zones because things are changing. When you start seeing those orange barrels and orange signs, that's a good sign that there may be something that's going to be different than it was yesterday evening when you drove through there," Dykes said.
To hear more from GDOT Traffic Engineer Jason Dykes, click play on the video above.
