With all but a half dozen roads open, the Greene County Highway Department is turning efforts to go back and make sure those roads are ready for the next rain event.
Greene County Road Superintendent Kevin Swatsell said that crews focused their early attention to clearing and reopening roads as quickly as possible. That involved not only removing downed trees over 150 or more roads, but after the floods scooping and pushing mud and debris off the roads. In some places, that mud was several feet deep. Crews pushed the mud forward or to the sides of the roads, but in some places that has clogged drainage ditches or created barriers on the sides of the road that Swatsell said could become a problem with the next rains.
Without clearing the shoulders and emptying ditches of mud, any runoff rainfall would flood the roadways or worse cause other washouts.
Pates Hill Road remains closed while the Army Reserve clears wood, trees, sand, and mud left along a half mile long section. Bird’s Bridge remains closed, as does Brown’s Bridge Road. Swatsell said a large section of the bank along Brown’s Bridge Road had washed away, and reopening that road will require a lot of work to stabalize it.
