Summer construction projects rolling along in Darlington
Construction has closed Center Hill Rd. to traffic as crews work on the sewer main replacement project. -Photo by Tallitha Reese
Several construction projects have been ongoing in Darlington through the spring and summer months, some of which have wrapped up and are already in use by the public.
Construction started on the new restroom facility at Darlington's swimming pool park back at the start of spring and was completed earlier in July. The new facility is currently being used by the public.
"It looks good and is a much needed addition to the park," said Doug Lindstrom, the parks and recreation director for the city of Darlington.
Another big project that is currently in progress is the sewer main replacement project on Center Hill Rd., Ohnstad Rd. and Galena St. Construction for this project began on June 30.
According to public works director Jeremy Williams, throughout this week the crew will be finishing up the sanitary sewer work and starting on the water main on Center Hill Rd. as well as installing storm sewers.
Then when the underground work is completed the roadwork will begin on Center Hill Rd. and the crew will also move down to continue with the sewer main progress starting from the Alice and Wells Street intersections and moving south along Galena St. back to where they started at the bottom of Center Hill Rd.
According to the Darlington Police Department (DPD), Galena St. will remain open when construction starts there, however there will be no parking allowed on Galena St. at all during the duration of the construction in order to ensure space for lanes of traffic, which will be shifted to the west side in order to accommodate construction equipment.
A letter sent by the DPD to residents explained that residents that live along the route will have access to their residences; however, access may be temporally unavailable due to the placement of the immediate construction site.
Williams also explained that along with this project the lift station at Darlington's business park will also be getting remodeled. The station will be updated with new pumps and a new control panel to help with increased flows in the area the lift station services.
"When this project is done with we should see a decline in the daily flows at the waste water treatment plant due to the fact that we are replacing a lot of leaking pipes that contributed to a lot of excess water that infiltrated our system," said Williams.
It is estimated that final construction will be completed sometime in the fall.
The last construction project planned for Darlington this year will be the Louisa St. retaining wall project, which was originally set to be bid out by the Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WisDOT) as part of their July schedule. However, due to some last minute plan revisions and some discrepancies in the plans, WisDOT decided to wait and bid it out during the month of August.
According to WisDOT officials, due to the later bid date and the actual start date of the project getting pushed back, the entire project will not be completed this fall, as originally anticipated, but in the spring of 2015.
What is hoped to be completed this fall is the 400 block of E. Louisa St. with any additional progress from there taking place, weather permitting.
Williams said that although there has been a slight holdup in the project, it is still moving forward as utility crews are in the area now, relocating natural gas, electric and telephone lines in anticipation of the project.
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