Cape city seeks to ditch West End Boulevard ditches

Cape Girardeau city officials want to ditch the ditches.

Replacing drainage ditches bordering West End Boulevard is planned in conjunction with reconstructing the roadway from Rose Street to Bertling Street.

But engineering the stormwater improvements “took longer than we expected,” said Jake Garrard, project manager for the city.

“The stormwater work has been a lot more complicated,” he said Thursday, explaining why the long-anticipated project is still not construction ready.

“So we are working to get rid of those ditches as much as possible,” Garrard said.

“Some areas, they will have to remain. But where we can, we are going to actually put in inlets and pipes and pipe the water instead of just having open ditches,” he said.

The $2.5 million project involves street reconstruction as well as the addition of curb and gutter and sidewalks.

“To curb the street, to try to get rid of the ditches to put the sidewalk in, we are going to have to do a lot of stormwater work,” Garrard said.

The city also is working to acquire all the necessary construction easements.

“We are still working through those as well,” he said. “There are quite a few homeowners along West End.”

What it all means is a construction contract for the transportation-sales-tax-funded project won’t be awarded this month as city staff had originally hoped.

Garrard said it could be early next year before a contract is awarded and construction begins.

Factoring in winter weather, construction may not begin until spring, he said.

According to the city’s website, construction could take nine months. But Garrard said the time frame for construction won’t be finalized until the design work is completed.

The project was promised to voters when they extended the transportation sales tax in 2015.

Planned improvements call for construction of two, 12-foot, concrete driving lanes.

The section from Rose Street to New Madrid Street also will have 5.5-foot bike lanes, one on each side of the roadway, a 6-foot-wide sidewalk on the west side and a 12-foot parking lane on the east side.

Sharrows, or street markings, will be placed on West End Boulevard, from New Madrid Street to Bertling Street, to show where bicyclists should travel on the roadway. There is not enough room for dedicated bike lanes, Garrard said. However, there will be an 8-foot-wide sidewalk constructed on the west side of the street.

“Since we didn’t have room to put dedicated bike lanes in, we tried to make a wider sidewalk,” he said.

While it won’t be a trail, Garrard said, “it will be a wider sidewalk to accommodate more pedestrians.”

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