Drivers who are getting weary of the continued construction on Old Lemay Ferry Road in the Arnold and Imperial areas should get some relief in the next couple of weeks.
Kurt Wengert, technical division manager for the Jefferson County Public Works Department, said the stretch of the road that has been closed from East Rock Creek Road through the entrance to the Timber Creek subdivision is expected to partially open soon.
“It may take a lot of barrels and cones put up, but we’d like to get some limited traffic going through there soon,” he said.
Wengert said he met with representatives from Gershenson Construction Co. in Eureka, which is doing the work, on Jan. 9 to talk about delays in the project, which under terms of the contract should have been wrapped up by the end of December.
Wengert said the wet and cold weather during the past couple of months of 2022 delayed crews from paving the area.
“We were able to get some paving done, but not all of it,” he said. “We’d have a day that was warm enough, but then we’d have rain. If there wasn’t any rain, it was cold. And then the asphalt plants closed down for the season.”
However, Wengert said, that doesn’t mean work on the project has ground to a halt.
“Crews have been installing guard rails and laying down lane striping where they can,” he said.
He said the Public Works Department is readying a request for a change order that will extend the time for Gershenson Construction Co. to complete work by Memorial Day (May 29).
“We’d like it to be sooner than that, of course,” Wengert said.
He said the Jefferson County Council may consider the change order as soon as its Jan. 23 meeting.
The work from East Rock Creek to the Timber Creek subdivision is part of the first part of a three-phase project to improve Old Lemay Ferry Road.
Work on the first phase began over the summer, but has bogged down because of problems in relocating utility lines as well as supply-chain issues.
“I know it’s been frustrating,” Wengert said. “We’re doing our best to get this section open to vehicle traffic and get all of this finished.”
The first phase involves realigning the section of Old Lemay Ferry from East Rock Creek to Spring Forest Road and adding turn lanes at both ends of the project, replacing a box culvert at East Rock Creek and adding guard rails and stormwater improvements.
Wengert said work on the second part of the project, from Timber Creek to Spring Forest, will begin soon after the first phase wraps up and should be done sometime this summer.
Gershenson Construction Co. was the lower of two bidders for the first phase. Half of the $4,215,220 project will be paid for through federal funds while the rest will come from the county’s share of a 1/2-cent countywide sales tax for road and bridge improvements.
Wengert said once the work on Old Lemay Ferry Road between East Rock Creek Road and Spring Forest Drive wraps up, the county will turn its attention to a project to improve Seckman Road between the I-55 Outer Road and the entrances to Mastodon State Historic Site.
That project will involve raising parts of the road out of the floodplain and adding curbs, shoulders, gutters and a closed drainage system.
But once Seckman Road is improved (that project is scheduled to be done by the spring of 2024), full attention will return to Old Lemay Ferry Road.
That project will involve making safety improvements from Kneff Road to north of Frisco Hill Road and will include wider shoulders, rumble strips, better warning signs and guardrails and widening the road around curves. Wengert said that work could possibly start late this year.
After that work is finished, the final project will start and entails reconstructing the portion of Old Lemay Ferry between Vogel Road and Spring Forest Road in addition to installing shoulders, making stormwater improvements and adding curbs and gutters.