SPANISH FORK -- For most of last year, folks like Lisa Weinmuller living near U.S. 6 championed a plan to build sound walls near the busy road to reduce the steady drone of traffic noise.
Those wishes will become real later this month when Geneva Rock begins working on the 12-foot to 14-foot walls."It's quite noisy," said Weinmuller, whose yard backs on the highway. "Especially when (the trucks) put on their jake brakes."
She was also concerned about the possibility of vehicles sliding off the highway and down the hill into her back yard. Julie Bohling shared that concern.
"They'll hit a concrete wall before they hit my yard," she said. The wall should also stop people walking along the highway from jumping fences and cutting through yards, she said. Although both residents said no one has ever left the roadway and landed in their back yards, the possibility concerned them.
Utah's Department of Transportation needed a two--thirds majority vote from residents before it would put up the walls, said Bryan Adams, project design engineer.
The vote for the nearly $1 million project was overwhelming.
"We got easily 80 percent," Adams said. Voting was by mail--in ballot.
U.S. 6 is a main highway that travels through Spanish Fork Canyon, important to Sanpete County and eastern Utah. Its heavy truck traffic is a main source of highway noise.
Like many of her neighbors, Lori Spendlove said the noisy highway makes it difficult for residents to enjoy their back yards.
City planner Emil Pierson called the walls a "double whammy" for residents on the north side of the highway because it will block not only highway traffic noise but noise from trains that also pass by periodically.
"I would want it if I lived there," he said. "They would be nuts not to want it."
UDOT officials met several times with city officials to coordinate the construction and deal with issues of utilities and crossroads, he said. "I met with them at least four times," Pierson said.
Construction will begin on the south side where residential development starts and proceed to 2000 East, a proposed street that when built will serve the developing east bench.
The walls will break for streets coming into U.S. 6, including Center Street, Adams said.
On the north side of the highway, the noise walls won't be as lengthy but will protect established residential areas there, including a new subdivision at 400 East, he said.
A noise wall originally planned to protect North Park near the I--15 off-ramp onto U.S. 6 won't be built, Adams said.
The walls are expected to reduce highway noise to 65 decibels or lower, he said.