                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

INTERMITTENT CLOSING OF HIGHWAYS SUBJECT TO FLOODING; PERMITS; NOTICE (§
33.2-266)

A. Upon application of the board of directors of any soil and water conservation
district and of the board of supervisors of the county wherein the highway is
located, the Department is authorized to permit the intermittent closing of any
highway located within the boundaries of such district and county whenever in
its judgment it is necessary to do so and when the highway will be
intermittently subject to inundation by floodwaters retained by an approved
watershed retention structure. All costs associated with such closing shall be
borne by the board of supervisors of the county, including the costs of
furnishing, erecting, and removing the necessary signs, barricades, signals, and
lights to safeguard and direct traffic.

B. Before any permit may be issued for the temporary inundation and closing of
such a highway, an application for such permit shall be made to the Department
by the board of directors of the soil and water conservation district and the
board of supervisors of the county wherein the highway is located. The
application shall specify the highway involved and shall request that a permit
be granted to the county to allow the intermittent closing of the highway.

C. Before making such application, the board of supervisors of the county
wherein such highway is located shall give notice of the proposed action by
publication once each week for two consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general
circulation in the county, and such notice shall contain a description of the
places of beginning and the places of ending of such intermittent closing. In
addition to such publication, the board of supervisors of such county shall give
notice to all public utilities having facilities located within the
rights-of-way of any highway being closed by mailing a copy of such notice to
the office of each such public utility located within the county, or if no
office is located within the county, then to the office of such utility located
nearest to the county. Furthermore, no such application shall be accepted by the
Department that does not certify compliance by the applicants with the
requirements of publication and notice in the manner prescribed in this section.
All costs associated with the application procedure and notice to the public and
to public utilities shall be borne by the board of supervisors of the county.

D. Not sooner than 30 days after the last publication and not sooner than 30
days after the mailing of such notice, the Department may issue the permit with
respect to such highway. Nothing herein contained shall require the Department
to issue such a permit when the Department, in its sole discretion, does not
consider such intermittent closing of highways to be in the best interest of
fulfilling the Department&#8217;s duties to the traveling public.

HISTORY: 1976, c. 172, § 33.1-223.2; 2014, c. 805.