UPDATE: KYTC engineers and City of Murray investigating frontage road sinkhole.
The KYTC Calloway County Highway Maintenance Crew worked with the City of Murray Public Works Department to excavate the site of a sinkhole along a frontage road near U.S. 641 across from Roy Stewart Stadium.
Engineers determined it is not a sinkhole. Plans from the 1980s indicated there was a large drainage pipe beneath the asphalt. However, during excavation engineers discovered there are three large drainage tiles that connect under the roadway at at this site that likely date back in to the 1970s.
Engineers believe a small leak at the intersecting point eroded soil beneath the pavement over many years, creating a hole that was about 22 ft deep and about 40 ft in diameter. Engineers have ordered materials required to repair the leak.
A crew will be back at the site early Thursday morning to completed that repair and start back-filling the excavated area. They anticipate getting a paving crew to the site sometime later Thursday or early Friday with the goal of reopening the entrance and frontage road by some time Friday.
PADUCAH, Ky. (Sept. 3 2019) — The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) and the City of Murray are working on plans to repair a sinkhole along a frontage road just off U.S. 641 near the Shops at Murray shopping center across from Roy Stewart Stadium.
Over the weekend someone reported what appeared to be a hole about the size of a volleyball in the pavement at an entrance to a frontage road off U.S. 641 near the Cracker Barrel Restaurant. Murray police responded to the site and determined there was a void beneath the pavement. The City of Murray public works department closed and barricaded the entrance pending further investigation.
This morning, KYTC engineers conducted a more detailed inspection of the hole and found it extended about 20 ft. below the pavement surface with about a 40 ft. diameter near the bottom. The sinkhole extends under the highway right of way and sidewalk near the northbound lanes of U.S. 641.
Further investigation of the area found that there is a major 36-inch diameter storm water drainage pipe about 18 ft. beneath the frontage road that has been in place since before 1985. Engineers surmise that the drainage pipe may have a leak that allowed flowing storm water to create the sinkhole.
KYTC engineers have requested a Before You Dig survey of the area with plans to excavate around the drainage pipe starting as early as Wednesday. Once they did into the sinkhole, engineers will have a better idea of the extent of repairs that may be required.
Motorists traveling U.S. 641 northbound should be alert for trucks entering and leaving the roadway at U.S. 641 mile point 8.5 just north of Chestnut Street in Murray. A northbound lane restriction may be required to facilitate the sinkhole excavation work.
Depending on what they find beneath the surface, KYTC and City of Murray crews may be working in this area most of the week.
Appropriate caution is required where equipment, flaggers, and construction personnel are along the roadway in close proximity to traffic.
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