NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — The box culvert underneath the Washington bicycle boulevard between 18th and 19th will be replaced after action Tuesday by the Hutchinson City Council.
"We got KDOT to agree to pause our federal grant for the TA program, while we do an emergency repair of the box," said Jeff Schenk with the city's engineering department. "We signed a contract with JEO, they have designed it, they reached out to all of the local contractors in the area that perform this type of work, under the intention of having the box done by April 1, so that way we can have the overlay done and have the bicycle boulevard open in early spring. Of course, that is a pretty aggressive schedule. Only one contractor was able to provide a number and had a crew available. That was Reese Construction."
The box itself is decades old at least and damage to the top of it was found when excavating to fix the sides of the box, which were already compromised.
"This box was constructed in the early 1900s, at least," said Schenk. "We haven't been able to find an exact date, but we did find a set of plans from 1936 that say the box was already in place. Reinforced concrete boxes typically have steel throughout the entire thing. The floor is tied to the walls. It's tied to the top, it's all homogenous. In this one, for some reason, the floor has structural steel in it, the walls are floating in between them with no steel in them, they are not reinforced and then the top is just sitting on top. None of it is tied together."
The $550,000 project is technically additional to the bicycle boulevard project and they will have to push back some later projects to pay for this one, as it's not part of the grant.
"We are also having to redo the curb that entire block," Schenk said. "It's a specially designed box. We raised the top of it to be the driving surface, so we didn't end up with this little tiny asphalt cap. The curb is going to be poured along parallel to it. It's going to be tied directly to it, so the top of this section should never have to be maintained again, some new ADA ramps, there's some extra work that also goes into this dollar amount. It's not like, just a box and then we have to come in and cover it and maintain all of the other stuff."
The council expressed reservations about the project, but ultimately voted unanimously for its approval Tuesday.
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