Published: May 15, 2008 10:42 am            

Building repair requested by county highway committee

By TESA CULLI

tesa.culli@register-news.com

MT. VERNON — The Jefferson County Highway Committee will recommend that a $20,600 bid to fix the roof and install a gutter and downspouts to the maintenance building that caught fire in 2006 be accepted.

The building, which was involved in a fire in December 2006, has had some repair work completed by the highway department, but portions of the roof and doors have not been fixed. The department asked for bids on fixing the roof and leaving doors off the building, which is being used to store large equipment such as tractors and trucks.

Although three contractors visited the site and looked at the building, only Lipps Construction offered a bid of $20,600 on the project. An alternate bid was submitted of $3,300 for insulation below the roof; and the bid also included a price of $300 for additional steel beams which might be necessary to fix the roof. Due to the rising costs of steel, the bid was only guaranteed through May 23.

The committee also approved a bid for a township bridge replacement in Mt. Vernon Township from Depew & Owens for $439,378. The estimates on the bridge were $500,105, with the bid coming in at less. Two other bids were received on the bridge project — from Southern Illinois Asphalt and Perry County Construction and were “considerably higher” than the bid from Depew & Owens.

A release of active and proposed projects was discussed. The active projects are:

n Bonnie road guardrail located one mile west of Bonnie. The wooden guardrail has been removed and is being replaced with steel guardrail. The length of the replacement guardrail project is 3,200 feet and is 50 percent complete. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is removing trees on the north side of the road and will soon dispose of the trees. The contractor on the project will wait until the Corp has taken care of the debris before replacing the guardrail.

n The Germany Road bridge, located six miles south of Belle Rive is a 166 foot, three-span prestressed precast concrete deck beam railroad bridge which is now complete and signed off on by the Illinois Department of Transportation.

n The Short Street Bridge in Bluford is a 150 foot precast prestressed concrete deck beam railroad bridge, and is 65 percent complete. The deck has been set and the contractor has poured the parapet wall and sidewalk. The contractor was scheduled to work on completion on May 12, but has been stalled due to rain.

n The Highline Road bridge in Casner Township is a 180 foot, precast prestressed concrete deck beam bridge spanning Rayse Creek. The project is 99 percent complete, with work slated to begin when weather allows to fix the area washed out by flooding.

n The Ina Road overpass located over Interstate 57 consists of 1,000 feet of pavement removal and replacement and ramp surface removal and replacement.

The project is 90 percent complete and some rework is necessary on the ramp portions of the project due to spalling of the asphalt overlay. The project is slated to restart on May 19.

        

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