We had a good amount of progress last week in both sections of the project. We saw the first of some
new pavement in Section A and more underground utilities go in on Section B. The upcoming week will
have a significant amount of visible change and progress in both sections. There will be some new
access impacts in both areas so please read the following summaries.
Section A:
 The contractors made some good progress last week with the construction of pavement and
some curb and gutter. On Monday crews constructed the southbound (west side) mainline
concrete pavement from Frazee to Front.
 The remainder of last week was spent placing the pavement north of Front Street, curb and
gutter in the Front Street Intersection, and pavement in the Front Street intersection.
 While this might not seem like significant work…it is. The intersections take a considerable
amount of work to complete. The curb and gutter is relatively complicated to form and must be
done by hand. The intersection pavement has to be done in multiple forms/pours. At the end
of the last week the Front Street intersection is nearly complete.
 Some curb and gutter was also placed in the Holmes intersection. We could only complete the
west half until the remainder (northbound) mainline paving is complete.
 We had hoped to have a little more pavement complete but cool day/night temperatures
resulted in slow curing of Monday’s mainline paving. This prevented the crews from being able
to place equipment on that pavement. In turn this delayed them from pouring the northbound
pavement or curb and gutter on the west side. The up side is cool temps and the slow cure
make for good concrete pavement!
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This week will be a lot more of the same. Crews will continue focus on getting the remaining
pavement and curb and gutter constructed.
 Monday will be a busy day. The contractor plans to pour the curb and gutter on the west side
of the street starting at 7:00 am. By the later part of the morning they hope to be placing the
remaining mainline pavement (northbound driving and parking lanes).
 By the middle of the week, crews will focus on construction of the sidewalk on the west side of
the street. This will obviously cause some access changes and interruptions. We will be
developing more detail for this work and communicate this with you in the next couple of
days. As they construct the sidewalk they will be taking down the temporary walk. This will
cause some short term interruptions in access. The good news is that once the sidewalk is
constructed, we will be able to use in less than 24 hours…no more rubber mats!!
 We will work with everyone closely on the timing of the sidewalk construction. If you have
special needs/concerns please contact me and I will try to accommodate these the best we can.
 Sellin has tentatively scheduled for the asphalt pavement to be place east/west of the Front
Street intersection next Friday. This means that this intersection MAY be complete and open to
traffic by next weekend! There are some things that need to fall into place for this to
happen…but that is currently the goal. This will help restore some of the vehicle access to the
downtown area.
Section B (Willow to Frazee):
 Last week Sellin finished all of the watermain and sanitary sewer main installation. We are
having some trouble passing a pressure test on a small portion of the watermain. Crews spent
the last part of the week digging up joints and trying to isolate the issue. They believe they have
zeroed in on the problem and it should be fixed.
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Another crew from Sellin worked on installing sewer and water services. Services are a
currently about 50% complete. The services should be completed by the later part of this week.
With the completion of the sewer and water in the first phase of Section B, we will be making
preparations to start work in the second phase of Section B, from Willow to the dental office.
By the middle part of the week crews will begin removing the last of the pavement (Willow to
the dental office). This will create some additional access interruptions. This work should take
less than two days to complete (maybe just one day). Once the removals are complete access
will be partially restored.
The only underground utility construction in the southern phase is storm sewer, which is
primarily on the east side of the road. Sellin will make every effort to maintain some level of
access to adjacent businesses during this work. As the storm sewer is installed they will grade
the street behind progress. This will be the last of the major excavation in this section.
By the early/mid part of next week all of the underground utility work will be complete.
By the middle of next week crews will be starting the street construction.
As you can tell there will be a fair amount of action this week and progress will be shifting and impacting
different areas as the week moves along. If you have not been to a weekly progress meeting yet, this
week would be a good one to come to. By Tuesday we will have a better picture of how things are going
to progress and how it will impact access to the various areas. I imagine this update may create some
questions and concerns from those of you directly impacted by the project. I encourage you to please
give me or other project staff a phone call with any questions or concerns.
For those of you in Section A, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. A couple more weeks and we will
be getting very close. For those in Section B the worst of the digging is just about over and things will
be getting put back together very soon. I again appreciate everyone’s patience and understanding. You
cooperation has made things go quickly and smoothly thus far.
Jon Pratt, PE
City Engineer