Prescription: Access

BRISTOL, Tenn. – Local officials hope to improve access to the Bristol Regional Medical Center with plans to extend Medical Park Boulevard.
The Bristol Tennessee City Council, the Sullivan County Commission and the Wellmont Health System might share in the cost of a study that will see if it’s feasible to stretch the road from its terminus at Meadowview Road to state Route 126.
“This is kind of an inexpensive first look,” Bristol City Manager Jeffrey Broughton said. He said the study, which would cost $15,000, will determine a possible route for the road’s extension and an overall cost for the project.
The proposal is outlined in a resolution sponsored by Sullivan County Commissioner Bart Long of Bristol. Long’s resolution will go before the county commission’s administrative committee at 6 p.m. today.
The full County Commission will consider the resolution at 9 a.m. Nov. 17.
The Bristol city government and the
Wellmont Health System “are prepared to move forward with the [study],” Broughton wrote in a letter to county officials.
The 1.5-mile-long Medical Boulevard loops around the Bristol Regional Medical Center complex as it connects West State Street with Meadowview Road.
Drivers coming from the south end of the hospital have two ways to get to this street from Route 126. The first one involves turning on Meadowview Road, which meets Route 126 between the Meadowview Shopping Center and a car wash, and driving 1.5 miles to get to Medical Park Boulevard.
“It’s kind of hard travelling down Meadowview Road,” County EMS Director Mark Vance said, adding his ambulances must slow down on this route.
“It’s a decent road but its curvy,” said Vance, who also represents Bristol on the county commission. “It’s a little bit harder route to get in on [than coming in from the hospital’s north side.]”
Drivers also can take Walnut Hill Road to Steeles Road, which runs into Medical Park Boulevard as it loops around the back end of the hospital.
This route also has much to be desired because it’s curvy, runs through a neighborhood and requires vehicles to circle the hospital’s parking lot.
Extending Medical Park Boulevard would carry a second advantage, Broughton said, because the area could be opened up for development.
Four medical complexes, including the Sapling Grove Urgent Care Center, already sit on a quarter-mile stretch of Medical Park Boulevard between Meadowview Road and the Bristol Regional Medical Center.
Both Broughton and Vance said local officials have discussed extending Medical Park Boulevard since the 1990s.
Broughton said the Bristol Tennessee City Council brought the project to the forefront in June when its members made finding a way to fund the proposed extension a top priority in the fiscal year 2009 Goals and Objectives Program.
Part of that goal included a way to pay for the projects, he said. In his letter, Broughton identified the Tennessee Department of Transportation’s Local Interstate Connecting Routes program as a funding source. This program provides matching grants of up to $2 million each fiscal year, and might work as a funding source for the Medical Park Boulevard extension because of the road’s proximity to Interstate 81.
There’s been talk about taking the road all the way to U.S. 11E, Vance said, but nothing about the project has come before the full county commission until Long’s resolution.
Long is proposing the study because most of the road for the project would be done in his district, Vance said.
“This is something they’ve been talking about for quite some time,” Long said. “I don’t think there have been any problems [with the back way to the hospital]. We’re just trying to show some good foresight.”
In his letter, Broughton said engineers with the Johnson City office of Mattern and Craig Inc. have agreed to do the study once the commission signs off on the deal. It will take them 60 days to come up with a draft report, he said.
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