Highway spans all of Texas from Arkansas to New Mexico

US 82 Corridor map

Press Release from Texas Department of Transportation, Sept. 13, 2023

PARIS, Texas – The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is working to shape the future for one of the most important highways in the Paris area (Grayson County is in this Paris, Texas area), and public input is crucial as the agency looks to meet the transportation needs of tomorrow.
TxDOT is conducting an online survey between Sept. 11 – Oct. 18, asking the public for its input and perspective on US Highway 82, which stretches across Texas for more than 570 miles from Arkansas to New Mexico.
The survey, part of TxDOT’s US 82 Texas Corridor Study, will give the public an important voice in shaping the future of US 82 and the many communities it serves. The corridor study is looking for ways to keep up with the state’s growing population, increasing traffic and booming economy.
The study examines currently planned transportation projects and analyzes additional safety, connectivity, bottlenecks, and other mobility needs along US 82 in Texas. The results of the survey will help TxDOT identify potential improvement needs and prioritize plans, policies, programs, and projects.
The study will consider the following key elements to identify and prioritize proposed projects along the corridor:
• Safety
• Mobility & Congestion
• System Connectivity
• Multimodal Passenger & Freight

Click here to find out more about the US 82 Texas Corridor Study and to take the survey.

The survey is also available in Spanish.

Story by Mary Jane Farmer

NOTE: An indictment is a formal charge and not an indication of guilt.

The Grayson County Grand Jury , during it’s most recent seating, indicted Van Alstyne resident David Prikryl on three charges of Harrassment of Public Servant.

Van Alstyne Police Lt. Steven Hayslip said that on June 4 of this year, officers were called to a house on Nash Street because of a disturbance in progress. Upon arrival, they learned that someone in the household had sprayed Prikryl with an over-the-counter pepper spray for his/her own safety. Officers placed the suspect under arrest and placed handcuffs on him. The suspect resisted arrest, and then reportedly spit on both a paramedic and a police officer. Once at the Grayson County Jail, he also spit on a jailer, Hayslip added.

Bail was set at a total of $30,000, ($10,000 on each of the three charges), payable in surety bonds. As of Aug. 21, Prikryl remained incarcerated.

Shown here is a mixture of Fentanyl and Ecstasy, seized during a recent drug bust made by Van Alstyne Police.

Article by Mary Jane Farmer, Van Alstyne News. Photo courtesy of Van Alstyne PD.

Van Alstyne Police took more than 400 grams of illegal and dangerous narcotics out of circulation Saturday (Aug. 12) with the arrest of a Tulsa, Okla., man.

Police Lt. Steven Hayslip reported that officers who were on routine patrol that evening stopped a vehicle going north on U.S. Highway 75 because they saw defective equipment on it.

The driver pulled over and the officers approached the stopped vehicle. Once at the window, they smelled the distinctive odor of marijuana, which the suspect tried to explain by saying that a friend of his had smoked marijuana in the vehicle earlier.

With this odor, the officers had cause to and did conduct a probable cause search of the vehicle.

They found a large, clear (zipper) plastic baggie in the front-seat passenger compartment. Inside it were numerous multi-colored and multi-shaped pills, weighing more than one pound, Hayslip said.

“Based on the officers’ training and experience,” Hayslip explained, “they believed the pills to be Ecstasy.” They next conducted a field test of the bagged ingredients, which tested positive for MDMA/Ecstasy, and that field test also tested positive for Fentanyl.

They placed the suspect under arrest on a charge of Possession of Controlled Substance PG 1B greater than 400 grams.

Hayslip added that the street value of the seized narcotics is approximately $40,000.

Hayslip explained earlier that “Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid approximately 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. Because of this potency, overdoses are increasing in an alarming fashion. As a matter of fact, Fentanyl is now the leading cause of death for adults under the age of 45.

“What makes Fentanyl even more deadly is that drug traffickers are cutting different substances with Fentanyl; for example, with methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroine. This means that users are buying certain narcotics only to be exposed to a drug more more potent than anticipated.”

This is not the first time that Van Alstyne PD has arrested people/suspects in possession of Fentanyl.

The Tulsa suspect paid his $30,000 bail in a surety bond with conditions applied to it, and was released from Grayson County Jail Sunday.

(More on Fentanyl in another article)