Concrete barriers block off the former southbound lanes of Ohio State Route 444 that, until yesterday, ran between portions of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base's Area A
FAIRBORN, OH -- On Tuesday, workers began the task of permanently closing off a 1.5 mile span of Ohio State Route 444, a major commuter artery for Fairborn, a city of over 32,000 residents east of Dayton situated in Greene County. The decision to close the portion of this 8.4 mile thoroughfare that ran through the base was first announced in March 2010 in response to neighboring Wright-Patterson Air Force Base's need to meet Department of Defense installation anti-terrorism/force protection standards. The now-shutdown stretch of this route, which sits on federal land originally leased to the state back in 1932 for the purpose of building the road, provided easy driving access to patrons of the base's Kittyhawk retail area as well as to the Wright-Patterson Medical Center. This closure now consolidates all parts of the base's Area A into one contiguous region and users of those facilities will now have to use alternative routes within the military perimeter to get to their destinations.
