Work to close roads in Ligonier, Fairfield, Mt. Pleasant townships, county covered bridge

Road closures are slated to begin Monday in the Ligonier Valley and in Mt. Pleasant Township as state road and bridge projects get underway.

PennDOT announced traffic restrictions also will be enforced as work begins on bridges in several Westmoreland County communities.

The closures will affect sections of Route 271 (Menoher Highway) in Ligonier and Fairfield townships, Hypocrite Creek Road in Fairfield and Ankney Hill Road in Mt. Pleasant Township.

Route 271 is expected to remain closed until late May between Old Route 271 in Ligonier Township and Turkey Inn Road in Fairfield. Crews will be replacing pipe.

A posted detour will direct drivers along routes 711, 56 and 403, into Cambria and Somerset counties.

Hypocrite Creek Road will be closed through late June, between Knupp Hill and Midget Camp roads, as PennDOT rehabilitates three bridges.

Motorists will be detoured along Route 711.

Work to replace a bridge over Welty Run will close Ankney Hill Road between Shady Lane and Route 982. Traffic will be detoured, potentially through late October, along Shady Lane, Heinman Road and Route 982.

Contractor Frank Gavlik and Sons will complete the bridge replacement, drainage improvements and reconstruction of road approaches at a cost of about $1 million. PennDOT crews will work on the Ligonier Valley projects.

Bridge preservation work, including use of an epoxy-based surface treatment, will cause single-lane restrictions between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday on 20th Street, between Locust Street/Burrell Hill Road and Coal Street/Penn Avenue in Penn Township.

A similar schedule of daily restrictions is set for preservation work Tuesday through Friday — in North Huntingdon, on Washington Avenue between Main Street and Morris Avenue; and in Hempfield, on Wendel Road between Turnpike Street and Arona Road and on Middletown Road between Griffith and Arona roads.

Nighttime construction will trigger single-lane restrictions between 6 p.m. and 8 a.m. Tuesday through Friday on North Center Avenue between Westinghouse Drive and Arona Road in New Stanton.

Performed by Mekis Construction, the work is part of a $2 million project to preserve 22 bridges on 16 routes. Traffic will be controlled by flaggers.

Road maintenance slated

PennDOT crews are planning these maintenance tasks next week:

• Pipe repair or replacement on Skidmore Road in South Greensburg and Hellein School Road in Donegal Township;

• A slide repair on Guffey Road in Sewickley Township;

• Shoulder cutting on Route 982 in Unity and Derry townships.

Crews will pick up litter along various routes.

To report a road maintenance concern or a dead deer on a state roadway, call PennDOT at 1-800-349-7623.

Paving set for Bells Mills Bridge

The Bells Mills covered bridge at the border of South Huntingdon and Sewickley townships is scheduled to close to traffic April 24-28 so Westmoreland County crews can repave the approaches.

Once a new layer of pavement has been applied, vehicles will have less vertical space to pass beneath the approach’s steel clearance beam, county engineer Vaughn Neill advised.

He noted the bridge is posted for a vertical clearance limit of 6 feet, 6 inches, and has a 4-ton weight limit.

“Vehicles that have cleared the steel clearance beam in the past may not be able to clear the beam moving forward,” Neill said. “Please take every precaution to assure your vehicle will fit under the steel beam once this work is completed.

“Some bigger trucks have attempted to go through.”

The red bridge on Bells Mills Road was built in 1850 over Sewickley Creek by architect Daniel McCain. The county rebuilt it in 1988, eight years after it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

It underwent a series of repairs following a fire in 2009 and hit-and-run accidents in 2019 and last September.