Surveyors are at work looking for the best way to construct a traffic light and turn lanes at an intersection many Marysville residents say is long overdue.

Navin Elementary on County Home Road opened in 2002. It sits just a half-mile from state Route 4. County Home Road meets state Route 4 in a “T” at the top of a curve and a hill.

Now that a new fire station is under construction across from Navin Elementary, officials say traffic is sure to increase.

Marysville City Councilman J.R. Rausch has been a longtime advocate of a traffic light at the intersection.

“It’s about time,” he said. “It has been a very dangerous intersection for a long time.”

City Engineer Valerie Klingman said plans for the reconstruction are just getting started.

“We have just hired our design consultant and they will be doing the preliminary survey work starting this week,” she said. “After that is completed, we will work with them on preliminary concepts and final design. So we are probably about four to six weeks away from having exact details on what we are going to do. We do plan to go to construction this summer, most likely in July.”

City Administrator Terry Emery said he hopes construction will be finished by the time the new fire station opens in September.

Rausch remembers seeing a few close calls at the intersection after the YMCA relocated its soccer program to the Joint Recreational District’s fields on County Home Road. At that time, he said, Ohio Department of Transportation officials said a traffic light was not warranted.

“How we avoided a fatality there for so long is by the grace of God,” Rausch said.

Results from a city-commissioned traffic study released in May 2011 recommended immediate installation of an actuated traffic signal at state Route 4 and County Home Road.

Other recommendations included the installation of left-turn lanes and improving the profile of state Route 4 to “correct the stopping sight distance deficiency and regrade to remove the intersection sight distance obstruction.”

The study took into consideration the possibility of the development of what’s known as the Cook property along state Route 4.

Klingman said owners of the property along state Route 4 and across from County Home Road put in a planned unit development (PUD) three or four years ago which included plans for a Meijer, banks, restaurants, gas station and office buildings.

Klingman said development of that area is not in the immediate future.

For now, adding a traffic light will be a welcome sight for many of the drivers who use that intersection every day. “I’m excited,” Rausch said. “It’s going to make it a lot safer.”