Serving Lucas, Ottawa, Sandusky and Wood Counties
After a successful joint project between the two communities helped get a portion of Walbridge Road repaved recently, officials in Walbridge and Lake Township are collaborating once again with a grant that will help get a large portion of Drouillard Road repaved.
“I'm ecstatic,” Walbridge mayor Ed Kolanko said. “This is good for everybody. It’s not just good for Walbridge. It's good for Lake Township, which includes Walbridge. It's infrastructure that's very positive and very much needed. It’s a few years out, but you have to plan for the future.”
Kolanko said he began conversations around a month ago about different grant opportunities, specifically about a Surface Transportation Block Grant (STBG) opportunity. It’s an ODOT-funded grant that is ran through TMACOG (Toledo Metropolitan Area Council of Governments). He then reached out to Lake Township administrator Mark Hummer, and the pair agreed that it would be a great joint opportunity.
Those discussions formulated into recent approval of grant funding for a $1.27 million project that will lead to the repaving of South Main Street down to Drouillard, past the airport and around the curve ending at the Lake Township administration building.
“We're looking at close to a million dollars of grant money to get that road done with a little impact to the residents and the taxpayers,” Kolanko said.
The TMACOG grant funds $625,000 of the cost, which has been approved, and additional grant money through the Ohio Public Works Commission (OPWC) could stretch that number to over $900,000. The remaining cost would be shared between the two communities, and it’s a 2030-31 project.
“We're one community binded by a school district, a fire department and a wonderful citizen base,” Hummer said. “We may have our separate governmental functions, but at the end of the day, we're really kind of one community working for all of our citizens. The opportunity to work with Walbridge and get some of these projects done, utilizing available grants, is a great step forward.”
Both Kolanko and Hummer said there has been confusion in the past over who owns just how much stretch of the road. In fact, Hummer said that some of the litigation history even goes back to the 1950s, where agreements that were made before any of the people involved now were even born about who’s responsible for maintenance and ownership that has clouded issues previously.
“Drouillard Road could be considered one of the main roads in Lake Township, and obviously we're facing some critical issues with funding for our road department,” Hummer said. “We obviously have a levy on the ballot in the fall just specifically to allow us to pave more roads, so anything we can get as a grant with Walbridge to pave a road that desperately needs it will free up money for other roads in the area that are in disrepair.”
Something unique about that stretch of road is that it’s considered a federal roadway, and this grant specifically applies to roads with such designations.
“The grants are available, and not every grant is going to be applicable to your jurisdiction, but we really have had a great relationship with our engineer partner from OHM, Michelle Carpenter, who's helpful in identifying that and has a lot of knowledge as it relates to some of those grant applications.”
Meanwhile, the collaboration between local governmental jurisdictions is a good sign.
“I think the spirit of cooperation is genuine, and not only this project, but more projects in the future,” Hummer said.
Route 20, Tracy Road intersection
Hummer also emphasized how important it is to show the citizens that township officials aren’t just relying on tax increases to solve issues, which includes the intersection at Tracy Road and Route 20, where township officials are working with Perrysburg Township, ODOT and the Wood County Engineer’s Office to potentially get some grant funding there.
Hummer said that intersection met the criteria for a study for a highway safety improvement grant, and that study commences this fall. The first grant cycle they can apply for will be in the spring of 2027.
“I would look forward to some sort of activity to improve the safety at that intersection,” he said. “I don't know whether it'll be a roundabout, but that would probably be what's preferred.”
Woodville, Millbury intersection
After another serious injury crash at the intersection of Woodville Road and Millbury Road recently, which resides within Lake Township’s oversight, Hummer said the intersection doesn’t currently meet ODOT’s required accident number to trigger an official study. However, he has requested they look back on it.
“We will continue to work with them because Millbury Road and 51 continues to have serious accidents on a semi-frequent basis,” Hummer said. “And added to that, especially in the summer, you have a large pedestrian population standing outside at Mel-O-Creme depending on the time of the day. A real tragedy could occur there.”
Hummer said they are hoping for some stopgap solutions from ODOT, which requires a 10-crash threshold within a three-year period to trigger a study.
“We’ve done it in the past and you'll see it,” he said. “The additional pavement markings need to be redone, which are trying to get people to line up at a 90 degree angle to 51, and those need to be repainted and hopefully that'll make it on their painting cycle for this fall.”
As far as the parking lot featuring places like Subway, Woodbury Market and Ryan and Tony’s Barber Shop, drivers can enter and exit from there onto the main highway, which creates additional issues and makes it more than a four-way intersection many times.
“It's a wide open corner, that's for sure,” Hummer said. “That would all be on ODOT just because they would have the primary road, and the egress and access is granted by them, and that probably predates the limited access that you see now when somebody builds a new commercial venture. The egress onto state highways is much more controlled, and I'm guessing that that predates that.”
