HUNTINGDON, Tenn. — Residents of the Forrest Ridge subdivision are frustrated about an entrance sign that they say blocks the sightline for drivers pulling onto Forney Road. On Tuesday night, August 25, one neighborhood spokesperson brought the issue to the Town Council.
Trisha Sanders said she’d spent more than a month trying to get information out of City Hall after neighbors raised concerns about the monument sign at the entrance to Grant Cove, where the street meets Forney Road.
“When you’re pulling out from that monument sign, you cannot see oncoming traffic at all,” Sanders said.
Every resident in the neighborhood signed a petition asking the town to address it.
Sanders said she called Barsto Construction, the subdivision’s original developer, first, and was told the company would look into it and follow up. After a week passed with no word, she turned to the city, hoping to find out whether the sign sat inside the road’s right of way.
“If it’s in the right of way, then the case is closed. It needs to get removed,” Sanders said. “If it’s not in the right of way, then we need to figure out something to do with it.”
She said the town’s sign ordinance defines what a sign is but has no setback or width requirements. She said she still doesn’t know whether the sign was ever permitted.
Mayor Chad Edwards apologized for the delay and said he had personally measured the distance from the road’s edge to the sign himself.
“It’s over nine and a half feet back,” Edwards told her. He used his own vehicle to test the line of sight.
Huntingdon Police Department said it has not worked any accidents at the junction of Grant Cove and Forney Rd. One officer said he’d been with the department off and on for 20 years and couldn’t recall ever hearing of an accident in the area.
Edwards said the distance he measured puts the sign outside of Forney Road’s right of way and on private property, which under state law makes it Barsto’s responsibility.
Town attorney Robert T. Keeton III elaborated.
“The subdivision builder, until such time as everything is deeded over to the town, is responsible for those things,” he said.
Edwards said the same is true of the subdivision’s roads, which Sanders also addressed.
She said the subdivision’s roads were installed roughly 15 years ago but never finished. The road base, she said, isn’t sufficient to support regular traffic.
Edwards said the town won’t pave the roads while construction in the subdivision is still ongoing, and compared it to Northwood Drive, where paving has been delayed for the same reason.
“If we start hauling dirt, moving dirt and concrete, it’s going to do the same thing over and over,” Edwards said.
He estimated blacktopping the roads could cost the town upward of $100,000, and said Barsto still owns six undeveloped lots in the subdivision.
Sanders also asked whether she could obtain public records related to the sign and the subdivision’s approval. Keeton said she would need to submit a formal records request, and council members said the town would follow up on that request and on a separate request Sanders made for meeting minutes.