Creston street work to begin week of May 14

The first of three public informational meetings in regards to the street reconstruction projects slated to start within the next few weeks in Creston was held Thursday evening at the restored Creston Depot.

Present were Austin Smith of Garden & Associates (the project’s engineer), several city administrators and about 40 Creston residents curious about how their streets might be affected by the work.

The meeting ran from about 5:30 to 8 p.m., and questions were answered regarding work to be completed on segments of South Chestnut Street between Taylor and Lucas streets, South Park Street between Adams and Kirby streets and West Howard Street between Sumner Avenue and Oak Street.

Specifically, these three projects will consist of total removal of the street surfaces, and in some areas replacement of the sewer and water lines. Once all removals and replacement work has been completed, a new concrete street surface with curb and gutter will be placed.

While work is being done on these streets, certain segments will be closed to all traffic and other segments may have limited access.

“Chestnut [Street] is scheduled to start the week of the 14th (May),” Smith said. “It’s scheduled for 70 working days, so if there’s favorable weather for the entire duration of the project, you’re looking at the end of August, early September. And this is total reconstruction out there. There’ll be limited access at times when their section of the street is removed, prepped and repaved.”

Smith added that Chestnut Street has limited underground work that’s going to be done, and will therefore be the quickest of the three streets to be finished.

For South Park Street, construction will also begin the week of May 14.

“But it will essentially finish about two weeks after the South Chestnut [Street] project,” Smith said. “The reason for that is there’s more utilities under Park Street that need to be replaced — more water mains, sanitary sewers and storm sewers.”

Smith explained while the crews perform underground utility work on the water mains, residents can expect their water service to be cut off for only a portion of one day while the work is being completed. He said Creston Water Works will notify residents the day before the temporary shutdown.

West Howard Street is slated to begin construction in the middle of June.

“The week of the 18th of June,” Smith said. “And that one has the longest timeline — 100 working days. So we’re into October, November on that project. And it’s got the same water main replacement, sanitary and storm sewer replacements as the others.”

Smith explained the contractors will assist the residents with mail collection, garbage collection and recycling throughout construction. Residents need not change how they set out their garbage and recycling bins. They will simply be taken away by the contractors to be picked up by waste management personnel, and then returned to the homes.

“It’s just so they don’t have to walk half a block to get their garbage picked up,” Smith explained. “That’s one of the big ones (questions) people usually ask.”

Smith said he will be present at roughly every other Creston City Council meeting to answer questions and give an update on how the project is progressing. In all, this is just the first phase of a roughly $4-5 million road construction project.

“We’ll be on site the entire duration of the project,” Smith said. “So if anybody has any questions or concerns, feel free to locate any of our crews or get ahold of me directly. Some of the concrete work will start as early as 6 in the morning. The majority of [it] will happen between 6 a.m. and 2 p.m., but the underground [work] might go from sun up to sun down, essentially.”