Brookron Dr. in New Tampa, once seemingly held together by a never-ending series of potholes patches, has a new surface.
Hillsborough County had all but completed the $686,841 project at our press time. The one-mile circular local road, located off Cross Creek Blvd. (across from the entrance to Cory Lake Isles) and winding past the communities of Pinehurst, Magnolia Trace, Meadow Creek and Creekwood to Kinnan St. in the Cross Creek development, had fallen into disrepair in recent years.
The project was originally expected to start later this year and finish in 2020.
The 18-year-old road is used by most of the Cross Creek II community’s 1,236 households, as well as by residents of the adjacent Addison Park and Andover Place apartment communities.
“They just showed up to fix it; it was very nice,” says Jo-Ann Pilawski, the head of property management for the Cross Creek II community.
In 2017, Pinehurst resident Sasenarine Persaud emailed county commissioners and the Neighborhood News to express disappointment that the county had approved $250,000 towards building an unplanned Kinnan St.-Mansfield Blvd. connector, while just a mile south was a busy road Persaud said was in “third-world condition” and “a motley (collection) of patches, ridges and depressions, with a new pothole opening every week.”
Due in part to the complaints of Persaud and Pilawski, as well as a handful of others, the county sent an engineer to do a full inspection of the road.
County commissioner Ken Hagan, who at the time held a District 5 county-wise seat but now represents New Tampa in District 2, was aware of the problem, as a former resident of Creekwood who had driven the road many times.
Although Brookron Dr. had been on the unfunded project list — meaning the 50 or so potholes repairs applied over the years would have to hold it together until at least 2021 or ‘22 — Hagan worked to get the road reclassified from a local to a connector road, and got it funded for fiscal year 2019.
Workers spent the month of August repaving the road. Also included in the work were ramp improvements for those with disabilities, and pedestrian improvements at the light at the intersection of Brookron Rd. and Cross Creek Blvd.
Pilawski, who says the county always promptly repaired any potholes she reported, praised Hillsborough’s efforts.
“I am really impressed with the response you get from the county,” she says. “I think they really do a good job. I’ve always found that to be the case. I don’t know if it’s because I complain so much, but they always respond.”
