M-52 shut both ways near Perry after crash between Beard, Bath roads

A crash closed M-52 in both directions between Beard Road and Bath Road, according to an incident alert posted on MDOT's Mi Drive traffic map. For drivers in the county's south end, that means the main north-south state highway was blocked in both directions at the same time — there is no parallel state route to slide over to, so anything moving through has to go out onto county roads.

That is nearly everything the state's alert says. The Mi Drive listing gives the roadway, the direction, the two cross roads and the word "crash." It does not say when the crash happened, how many vehicles were involved, whether anyone was hurt, which agency responded, or when the highway was expected to reopen. It does not offer a detour.

Under this newsroom's rules, an alert is not a crash report. We are reporting what the state posted and nothing beyond it. No investigating agency has released findings on what caused the crash, and this story makes no claim about that. We have not seen an injury count from any agency, so we are not publishing one.

The gap is the pattern here. The Current reported on Sept. 3 that the Mi Drive map listed an I-69 eastbound lane restriction running to Nov. 17 without saying why, who was doing the work or what it cost. On Sept. 5 and again Sept. 6, we reported that the Shiawassee County Road Commission was reposting the same one-day M-21 and Wren Road closures with no detour, no contractor and no finish date. County drivers keep getting the location of a closure and none of the information they would need to plan around it.

Beard Road and Bath Road are the kind of two-lane county connectors that absorb the traffic when M-52 stops — the same roads school buses and farm equipment use. No agency has said whether traffic was routed onto them, or for how long.

What happens next: A crash report, when one is released, is the document that answers the questions the map alert does not — time, vehicles, injuries, citations and how long the road was blocked. We have asked for it and will publish what the responding agency provides, including the finding on cause when investigators reach one. If you drive M-52 between Perry and Morrice, check Mi Drive before you leave; the state updates the incident layer as conditions change.