Date:
Friday, January 25, 2008
Contact:
Chris Damitio, Project Engineer 360-788-7400 (Bellingham)
Dustin Terpening, WSDOT Communications, 360-757-5997 (Burlington)
BELLINGHAM - Utility companies are nearly finished moving power lines and utility poles, and contractors have installed most of the waterlines and drainage systems as part of WSDOT’s project to expand five miles of Guide Meridian from Horton Road to Ten Mile Road.
But the progress hasn’t been without headaches for drivers and property owners.
Drivers continue to deal with abrupt ruts across the road, and residents have suffered through interrupted power, phone and water service. WSDOT apologizes for any inconvenience. Crews are working as quickly and carefully as they can on some difficult and frustrating tasks, and neighbors have received notices and information so they can prevent problems on their properties.
Traffic shifted to new lanes
The most visible change for drivers recently has been a shift to new lanes at the north end of the project at Four Mile Creek and Ten Mile Creek bridges. This gives crews room to build the east half of two bridges, work that is scheduled to wrap up this summer.
Shoulders will remain closed during the day while crews work on utilities and building new lanes, and one lane is closed at night while they paint lane stripes and install drainage systems.
Updated construction-related traffic information is available at www.wsdot.wa.gov/Northwest/Baker/Construction.
Smoothing the ruts
Those ruts drivers travel across are the trenches crews had to dig to install new waterlines and drainage systems. There are close to 100 trenches in those five miles.
During the slow construction periods, asphalt companies generally run limited operations. It isn’t economical to fire up the asphalt plant for a few patches, so crews will wait until they have a number of them to do at once. In the meantime, they temporarily patch the trenches with cold asphalt that wears off the pavement more quickly than hot asphalt.
Also, the soil underneath the pavement is settling, causing vehicle tires to thump when they roll over the trenches. Paving crews have repaired about 80 of the trenches with hot asphalt, but they must continue to monitor them for settling and make repairs. They still have about 20 trenches that they will repair with cold asphalt for now.
The surface will not be as smooth as it should be until crews can pave the whole five-mile stretch when construction is nearly complete late this summer.
Water woes at bay – for now
Installing water and drainage systems has had contract crews navigating a web of waterlines in a dance similar to Catherine Zeta-Jones bending through laser beams – except their big construction equipment isn’t quite as nimble.
In an effort to leave most of the adjoining property in the hands of the current property owners, WSDOT has kept land acquisitions as narrow as possible. Those narrow spaces are corridors for numerous utility lines. And even though records show generally where waterlines are underground, they don’t provide enough detail for such close quarters. Unfortunately, that means big equipment in tight spaces has an increased chance of hitting a waterline.
On top of that, we’ve found prohibited drain pipes connected to the state system. We’re working with property owners to fix the drain pipes. In most cases, we didn’t know the pipes were there and accidentally buried them, causing some flooding on a few properties. WSDOT understands that many of the connections were established long ago and is willing to work with property owners, but drainage ultimately is the property owners’ responsibility.
If property has flooded or owners are seeking permits to use WSDOT’s system they should call WSDOT project engineer Chris Damitio.
The good news is that crews finished most of the work on waterlines and drainage along this stretch. The bad news is that the problem will move north later this year when WSDOT starts construction on the next section from Ten Mile Road to Lynden. Problems may be lessened because homes and utilities are less densely packed in that stretch.
Moving utilities slow, but going
Utility companies and water associations are nearly finished moving utilities away from the existing highway. It’s a deceptively big effort.
Crews moved about 127 power poles. They can set about seven poles a day if everything goes smoothly, allowing them to move about a mile of power line a month.
Other utilities, such as cable and phone companies, can only move their lines once the poles are set.
The people who move the power lines and poles are the same people who repair lines and poles during windstorms, so they have their hands full.
Condemnation update
Recent news stories have focused on efforts to buy property needed for the next phase of the Guide Meridian expansion – from Ten Mile Road to Lynden.
For the most part, that’s going smoothly. Of the 78 properties along the highway in the project area, nine went to condemnation.
Owners of four of those properties have granted WSDOT access to their land so the project can continue during price negotiations. WSDOT expects to have similar agreements for four more condemned properties soon. One property owner still hasn’t responded to WSDOT’s requests to use his property during the condemnation proceedings.
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