During a discussion with Highway Superintendent Jason Peters during the Monday meeting of the Marshall County Commissioners, access for the Argos industrial park off of U.S. 31 became a topic.
President of the Commissioners, Stan Klotz, brought up the topic of the future plans of INDOT for U.S. 31 and U.S. 30, stating he had attended an INDOT meeting in Fulton County regarding the interchanges for U.S. 31, saying that the town of Argos was “very nervous” about the state’s plans and having access for the town off the highway.
Klotz said that area is “primed for growth,” and the town wants to ensure access to the highway.
He told the other commissioners that he and others had pushed for the state to provide some sort of interchange near State Road 10 to give the town that access, but said he felt the state was leaning towards closing access between State Road 10 and State Road 110.
The discussion had begun surrounding the INDOT query about the county wishing to provide the P.E., preliminary engineering, for the projects they had submitted for consideration for the coming year. Peters said that it was his impression that entities that did so might receive a more favorable result in grant awards for the balance of those projects since they “already had skin in the game.”
One of the projects submitted by the county was on Linden Road near Argos that would provide a possible solution, but INDOT had turned the project down on the current round of grants.
Peters told the Commissioners the PE for that project would be over $800,000. Commissioner Jesse Bohannon stated that he would not commit to doing that, especially without some sort of assurance that the balance of the project, between $6 and $7 million, would be picked up by INDOT.
The Commissioners took no action on the matter. The Town of Argos and Marshall County continue to push for some sort of interchange off U.S. 31.
