Part of Cape's Main Street may be torn up for stormwater tunnel repairs

Some sections of newly paved Main Street may have to be torn up to repair a downtown Cape Girardeau stormwater tunnel, deputy city manager Molly Hood said Monday.

A recent water-main break may have damaged an underground drainage tunnel, Hood said.

Four sections of pavement along Main Street near the Independence Street intersection may have to be removed as part of the project, Hood said.

Hood said a damaged tunnel could wash out ground under Main Street.

“We want to make sure there are no voids under the street,” she said.

The $1.24 million project to spruce up downtown with new pavement, sidewalks and lighting on Main Street began in February and was completed last month.

City engineer Casey Brunke said city crews plan to access the tunnel through a manhole to determine whether the structure was damaged when a nearby water pipe broke May 28.

The water pipe has been repaired, but the condition of the stormwater tunnel is uncertain.

“We don’t know if damage occurred,” she said.

But Brunke said the water main “basically goes through the top” of the aging, stone masonry stormwater tunnel.

If the tunnel needs repairs, the city will do the work, she said.

Fronabarger Concreters, the contractor on the Main Street project, would come back and repave the torn up sections of Main Street, Brunke said. The city will work to keep the street open as much as possible during any repairs, she said.

“When it is done, it will all look brand-new,” Brunke said of any repaving.

mbliss@semissourian.com

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