Route 54 Work To Continue Through Summer

FENWICK ISLAND — The Delaware Department of Transportation (DelDOT) announced this week road construction on Route 54 through West Fenwick will continue through the summer months.

The project, which began last November, consists of widening the existing roadway and adding a 14-foot-wide center left turn lane in order to improve safety for vehicular traffic as well as bicycles and pedestrians. Improvements will also include six-foot-wide bike lanes and five-foot-wide sidewalks. The Route 54 construction project will extend from the intersection at Route 20 to the Mallard Lakes community.

According to DelDOT officials, because of the necessary safety improvements and the large scale of the $8.1 million project, the work must continue during the summer months the impact on resort area traffic. If work was not permitted during the summer months, the project would drag on much longer and create larger impacts for motorists and business owners.

The project is expected to be completed by early summer 2012. Motorists can expect intermittent lane restrictions or lane shifts between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. on Monday through Friday. No work will be undertaken on weekends or holidays. DelDOT will monitor the area during the summer months and adjust signal timings as needed.

Dew Tour Inks Title Sponsor

OCEAN CITY — The Dew Tour this week announced Pantech Wireless, Inc. has signed on as the official handset partner of the Dew Tour, title sponsoring the opening event of the 2011 season in Ocean City.

The Pantech Open will take place July 21-24 in Ocean City. Pantech, an innovative and leading mobile phone manufacturer, is hitting the U.S. market full throttle with a fully integrated tour-wide sponsorship. Pantech will have exclusivity in the handset category, along with national media benefits across NBC, USA and MTV2, digital benefits within Allisports.com, onsite activation rights and benefits across all Dew Tour events, and inclusion in the Tour’s multi-million dollar marketing campaign. This sponsorship will strategically compliment the launch of several anticipated Pantech products over the coming months. Pantech phones can be found at AT&T stores and retailers nationwide.

“Dew Tour is a perfect platform for the Pantech brand that allows us to directly interact with our core audience,” said Erin Magee, Director of Channel Marketing for Pantech. “With Pantech’s market share rapidly increasing and customers asking for our products by name, we feel it’s time to expand our visibility in a bold way.”

Geocache Dash Set For Next Week

SALISBURY — Wicomico County next week will host a Geocache Dash, a family-friendly event during which participants will search for nearly two dozen caches, or clues, in a scavenger hunt of sorts all over the county.

This free event will kick-off a new geocaching virtual trail that takes cachers to 22 exciting locations across Wicomico County.  The Wicomico County Convention and Visitors Association, along with Wicomico County Recreation, Parks and Tourism will host the event next Saturday, June 11.  The day will begin and end at Pemberton Historical Park. 

The Geocache Dash will launch Saturday morning at 8 a.m.  Cachers can register, pick-up their passports and cache information at Pemberton Park.  From there, the search will be on for caches, which have been placed in locations such as parks, marinas, museums and historical sites. Two of the caches will only be accessible by boat, canoe and/or kayak.  During the launch of the trail, kayaks will be available free of charge from designated boat launch areas.  After June 11, cachers will need to provide their own water transportation to access the caches.

After a full-day of searching, cachers can return to Pemberton Park to celebrate their finds.  During the celebration, which will last from 5-8 p.m., the first 200 cachers finding 18 or more caches will receive a custom 2011 Wicomico Geocache Dash trackable geocoin.

Wicomico River Report Complete

SALISBURY — The Wicomico River Creekwatchers this week announced its annual report on the health of the river for 2010 has been completed and is ready for presentation. 

In a joint endeavor, volunteer citizen creekwatchers sampled 24 sites along the extent of the Wicomico River every other week from March to November, and Salisbury University students analyzed the water quality to determine levels of pollutants. The 2010 Wicomico Creekwatchers results show modest improvement in some areas compared with the averages from the past several years. However, water quality is still impaired in many sections of the river, and much work will be needed on all fronts to achieve a healthy river.

The 2010 report will be highlighted on June 8 as part of a press conference featuring new environmental initiatives of the City of Salisbury, which helps to fund the costs of the Creekwatchers program.