The Douglas County Commission meets in the historic courtroom on the second floor of the county courthouse, 1100 Massachusetts St.

Douglas County commissioners gave the green light Wednesday to a plan to improve County Route 1055 near Vinland, but the county’s public works leader told them work on the project would start a year later than was previously discussed.

Keith Browning, Douglas County public works director, said the public works department agreed in recent days to delay the project until 2020 so that it could focus in 2019 on adding paved shoulders to another portion of CR 1055 that runs from the Wakarusa Bridge to the road’s intersection with County Route 458.

The plan commissioners approved for 2020 would add shoulders and reduce the steepness of ditches on a section of CR 1055 from its intersection with North 700 Road at Vinland to about a quarter-mile north of the curve at East 1650 Road. The project would also replace two box bridges and two culverts in the section and add a turn lane at the Vinland intersection for traffic headed south to Baldwin City. The CR 1055 curve half a mile west of Vinland would retain its 40 mph speed limit, but the paved shoulders and improved ditches would increase its safety, Browning said.

The plan replaced a previously discussed design that would have implemented a 55 mph speed limit at the curve, Browning said. With the low history of traffic accidents on the section, he couldn’t justify the greater expense of that alignment, he said.

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