Upper Milford officials made it clear last week they do not like the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation's proposed reconstruction of the railroad bridge on Chestnut Street south of Emmaus, with the planning commission even threatening legal action to stop the plan.

Supervisors, at the Aug. 6 meeting, were also clearly unhappy with the format of the informational meeting held by PennDOT July 22. There were no chairs in the township building's auditorium and no presentation by PennDOT officials. There were just copies of the plan available and it was apparent PennDOT did not expect and did not plan for the approximately 60 people who showed up at the auditorium.

One resident was not aware until he came to the meeting the plan targeted his home for condemnation.

One of the issues with the plan, Township Manager Daniel DeLong said, was that PennDOT wants to keep Chestnut Street open during the reconstruction, which "absolutely" impacts the design of the project.

PennDOT is proposing a two-lane bridge north of the existing bridge, with no sidewalks. At least one lane of Chestnut Street will be kept open throughout the construction in PennDOT's plan.

Supervisors acknowledged it would be difficult to come up with a reasonable detour if Chestnut Street was closed, but criticized PennDOT for not taking other measures to make the construction phase easier and called the proposal inadequate to handle the volume of traffic in that area.

"Why don't they make it four lanes?" Supervisor Daniel Mohr asked.

Supervisor Rob Sentner called the proposal "a half-ass band-aid" and supervisors Chairman George DeVault declared, "If there's any way to fight this, I'd dig in our heels and fight."

Supervisors unanimously agreed to hire Benchmark Engineering to do a full traffic study of the area so they can be prepared to take their case against the plan to PennDOT.

In other meeting business, Assistant Township Manager Tim Haas told the board the fire department study committee is discussing a false alarm ordinance, which would charge a fee to property owners for false fire alarms to their property.

This would help compensate the fire departments, Haas said. DeLong said most such ordinances allow property owners a couple of "freebie" false alarms.

Supervisors also agreed to look into allowing people to pay delinquent tax bills with credit cards. DeLong said more people would probably pay their bills if they had this option. The issue to be determined is whether the township would have to absorb the credit card service fee, or if it could be added to the property owners' bills.

The board also met in executive session for almost an hour to discuss real estate, not returning to open session until 8:45 p.m., despite DeVault promising at the beginning of the meeting supervisors would try to adjourn in time to watch that night's much-ballyhooed Republican presidential debate.