Moon Area School District's secondary schools project has cleared its last municipal hurdle.

Moon Township supervisors granted final approval to the district's plan to construct a new high school and remodel the current high school into a middle school.

District officials brought "a plan that looks to be one of the best campuses in western Pennsylvania when it is finished," said Tim McLaughlin, supervisors' chairman.

"You have come night after night showing us drawings, and you have stepped to the plate."

With the final approval in hand, campus work will start within weeks.

The former Carnot Elementary School will be demolished as part of the project's first phase, and grading work will start on the acquired property near the high school entrance and the northern end of the softball field.

Meanwhile on University Boulevard and Beaver Grade Road, a pair of new traffic signals will improve the flow of traffic around the 28.64-acre secondary schools campus.

Estimated to cost up to $1.5 million, the new traffic lights will be installed at the high school exit, making it a two-way access point, and at the new middle school entrance, which will be roughly 100 yards from the current entryway.

High school construction will start near the current middle school in late 2008 and the new building should be occupied by December 2010.

Middle school renovations could start in 2009 or 20010. A new schedule is beng developed after the board's vite to move fifth-gradeers to the new middle school.

All work is expected to be completed by August 2012, in time for the current seventh-graders to be the first class to graduate from a new high school.

For Mark Scappe, school directors' president, the approval has been a lengthy wait. The approved plan is similar to the first secondary schools plan proposed by a board majority that was toppled in 2005.

New majority directors pursued another project that would have renovated the high school and constructed a new middle school until the former majority gained power again during November's general election.

"It's been a long time coming. Finally, after four or five years, we have final approval for this plan. We got the green light all-around," Scappe said.

Previously, township meetings discussing Moon Area plans lasted hours. The final approval, after multiple appearances by the district's architects before township supervisors, took less than 30 minutes.

"Since January, everyone has been working together. There is a lot of debate, but it was something we could work with," Scappe said.

"We were able to take their questions and give them answers."