The Wilton Road dam owner and the Department of Transportation have signed an agreement to allow repairs.

State Rep. Micah Caskey, who lives near Wilton Road, reported the breakthrough last week.

A part of Wilton Road in Springdale was washed out in the flood of October 2015. Wattling Road is to its west and I-26 and Rainbow Drive are to its east.

Since it was damaged, disputes over ownership of property and the permission to work on the site beside the road have delayed restoration. But that has changed.

Andy Leaphart, SCDOT’s chief engineer for operations, said the agreement is a significant step toward repairing the dam.

“It took some time, but this was a huge hurdle,” Leaphart said. He said with the agreement in hand, now SCDOT can work toward a plan that ties the road bank into the dam. Without permission to touch the private dam, SCDOT could not “tie soil.”

Caskey said “this development is the most important step we’ve had since it all started.”

Leaphart said the design process will be ongoing for another 2 months. After that SCDOT will bid the project out to contractors and dirt would begin to move to complete repair of the road in the spring.

The traffic count on Wilton Road, before it washed out, was 4,400-vehicles-a-day. Leaphart said the washout changed a busy road into a quiet cul-de-sac.