Tensions have been somewhat high across the county recently, due to frustrations with trash collection and road construction on the interstate, and Christian County Judge-Executive Jerry Gilliam says he understands it completely.
That said, he urged people to find their patience and not take out their frustrations on the staff of his office, as they’re also working to get what answers they can and speed things up, if possible. Regarding the switch from GFL to Impact Waste Services, Gilliam says most of the hiccups have been on the GFL side, as GFL cans remain uncollected across the unincorporated parts of the county.
GFL hired a third party to collect those herby-curbies, but if they were older, differently branded cans or if they had trash in them, those cans were not collected. Gilliam says Impact Waste has offered to collect the trash for GFL, but they have to be given permission first.
Some folks went almost two weeks with no trash collection in the transition, and some commercial trash collection has been even longer. Gilliam says they’re doing what they can to get that addressed, and they intend to see that those commitments made by GFL are upheld.
Then, over on I-24, road construction and accidents within that zone continue to plague the stretch of road between the 88 and the 92 mile-markers. That area has had numerous collisions since work began, including a seven-car pile-up on the Fourth of July weekend that sent 13 people to area hospitals for injuries.
Judge Gilliam says they’ve been in frequent contact with the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, including a meeting set for Thursday morning, to see what else can be done to make things safer.
He says a lot of the crashes seem to be involving people not from here who don’t know the area well, and construction zones always bring their own challenges.
The months long project will completely redo a five-mile stretch of road as crews work to replace the road surface with asphalt, removing the current concrete. East and west bound lanes are sharing the eastbound side of the interstate, leading to very congested traffic. Work is expected to be completed sometime in August, weather permitting.