Some Polk County neighborhoods to get new sidewalks
WINTER HAVEN, Fla. (FOX 13) - Polk County just announced which neighborhoods will get sidewalks. A stretch of Clubhouse Road is one of them.
That’s a welcome relief to John Browning. He says especially in the morning and evening, people are out jogging, walking their dogs and riding their bikes on the road, because there are no sidewalks.
“A lot of people are not paying attention to the cars,” he told FOX 13. “They have their headphones on, and if you’re not paying attention, it would be really easy to get hit.”
The county is already working on project not far from Brownings.
They are installing a sidewalk in the wake of Kalen Kirk being killed.
He was hit on his way to the bus stop by a vehicle driven by a crossing guard two years ago.
This year, Polk County started off with 66 requests for sidewalks. A community advisory council ranked the requests and narrowed them down. It then recommended 12, the ones they saw as the most dangerous, to have sidewalks installed.
“This county of 2,000 square miles, has a lot of needs and a lot of locations,” commented Assistant County Administrator Bill Beasley. Beasley says there are many more requests for sidewalk than money to pay for them.
It is going to end up spending $2.5 million to put down five miles of sidewalks.
To find out where, go to www.polk-county.net.