Commissioners discuss Snow Hill Road safety concerns after fatal crash

OOLTEWAH, Tenn. (WDEF)- Last Thursday, an Ooltewah High School student died in a fatal crash.

Now, many are demanding fixes to the road in which that crash occurred.

 According to an obituary from Dignity Memorial Funeral Home, the victim in the crash was 16 year old Maxwell Quarles.

The Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office said that Quarles died after losing control of his truck and going off of Snow Hill Road.

Portions of the road have already been earmarked for improvements, but many are saying more should be done.

Commissioner Dr. Steve Highlander of Hamilton County District 9 said, “I just have had a grandson that graduated from Ooltewah High School. He’s in the military now. 16 and 17 year old drivers are not experienced, and when they have a road that’s narrow and twisting and with no shoulders, and we need to do everything we can. I have been asking for it (improvements) for three years… There is so much development there, there’s so much more traffic than there was a few years ago, I mean hundreds and hundreds of homes have come in. I’ll be honest, I have not supported a lot of the excessive growth. We need to have reasonable growth, but not excessive growth. Infrastructure needs to keep up with the development.”

 According to data from the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office, there have been well over 100 crashes on Snow Hill Road in the past five years, but there could be changes soon.

Dr. Highlander said, “To the mayor’s credit, he has come up with that unincorporated roads committee, and had an engineering company come in and assess the needs, and Snow Hill is on the list to be done. It’s not on the list right now, but it’s on the list to be done in the future.”