The Lincoln County Board of Supervisors approved a measureMonday that will see all of the county’s private drives marked withblue road signs. All public roads will remain posted with greensigns.

“We’re doing this to lessen the confusion on new countyemployees,” said County Litter Control Coordinator Ronnie Durr, whois in charge of maintaining the county road signs. “When they see ablue sign, they will know automatically not to go down thatroad.”

Durr said helping county employees better distinguish betweenprivate and public roads is important to stop work from being doneaccidentally on private roads, because the county cannot fund theupkeep of private roads.

Currently, all Lincoln County road signs are green, with privateroads being marked as such by the word ‘private’ in small print.However, workers sometimes have trouble making the distinction.

“It’s easy to get messed up out there,” Durr said. “The signsalready say private, but in the dusty cab of a tractor, it can behard to see.

“These blue signs will help the supervisors and the employeeseasily tell the difference between a public and a private road whenthey’re out there doing their jobs,” Durr said.

The costs of replacing all the county’s private drive road signswill be minimal, county officials said.

The blue color is the only difference between the new signs andthe old. They all use the same posts and hardware, which is alreadyinstalled.

Durr said the replacement project will begin after the first ofthe new year.

Durr’s first step will be to gather a list of all private drivesin the county from the 911 coordinator. He will then create andbegin installing the signs, with the first new, blue private roadsigns showing up on the roadsides by Valentine’s Day.

“Hopefully, we’ll be done by the middle of February,” Durr said.”I’m not gonna start this process until after the first of theyear, because right now is a bad time of year to start orderingsupplies. People are off work, and I don’t blame them.”

The idea to have all the county’s private roads’ signs changedto blue was first proposed by District Four Supervisor Doug Moak.The supervisors dispatched Durr to research the project at the lastmeeting on Nov. 19.

“I had seen many other counties use blue signs for privateroads,” Moak said. “I thought it would be a good idea for us. Itwill help the county workers do their jobs, and it will also takesome confusion out of the general public; help them navigate aroundLincoln County. When they see that blue sign, they’ll know that aroad is private and not to travel down it.”