Nov 3, 2014 By The 2 min read

Greene County Commission Chairman Chuck Morris hailed the award of a $1.3 million state grant to the Greene County Airport.

Morris said the grant will improve traffic flow by paving a road at the airport’s main entrance at Route 21 and Murtha Drive. He said traffic signal will also be installed by that intersection. He said infrastructure improvements will aid future economic development.

“These improvements are necessary, beneficial and will help traffic in that area,” he said.

Morris said long before the grant was awarded, the commission had been planning to make expenditures necessary to improve the road by the airport. Now that the commission has the grant money, taxpayer funds that can be used in other ways.

“Because we were awarded the grant, that frees us up so that we do more work elsewhere in ways that’ll be beneficial to the townships or boroughs,” he said.

The grant is among 86 projects in 35 counties that will be funded with $84 million from the state Transportation Department’s Multimodal Transportation Fund Investments. Besides the multimodal projects, PennDOT is investing $7.2 million in Act 89 transit funding for five transit projects that applied for multimodal funding.

Selections were based on such criteria as safety benefits, regional economic conditions, the technical and financial feasibility, job creation, energy efficiency and operational sustainability. Projects require a 30 percent match from local sources.

Last month, a $500,000 Transportation Fund grant was approved for widening the E. Roy Furman Highway (Route 21), drainage improvement and pedestrian walkways.