Weather slows Jackson roundabout, Center Junction projects; both remain on-schedule

An unusually wet August has delayed construction at the Jackson roundabout and Center Junction, but representatives from the Missouri Department of Transportation say it won’t affect completion times.

“It has been unusually wet — very much so,” said Brittany Peterson, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Paducah, Kentucky. “August is typically the driest month of the year we have.”

From Saturday through Monday, Jackson saw 9.41 inches of rain, which MoDOT roundabout project manager Eric Krapf admitted crews had not anticipated.

“Certainly, the rain over the weekend has slowed our progress, but we’re in real good shape regarding the amount of work that’s been done and the amount of work that’s left to do out there,” he said. “That’s obvious to anybody who goes out there and drives by it.”

Despite the delay, he said, MoDOT isn’t concerned about seeing the roundabout open to traffic by Oct. 31 as scheduled.

“Who knows what will happen between now and then with this weather, but a lot of the work that would be affected by the weather has been done,” he said. “The stuff they’re doing on the walls and stuff like that, the facade replacing ... you know a lot of that stuff’s not as weather-dependent as earthwork is, so you’ve not got that issue.”

MoDOT resident engineer Brian Holt said the concrete work for the roundabout project is about 75 percent done.

Holt, who also is overseeing pavement repairs to the Center Junction on U.S. 61 beneath the Interstate 55 overpass between Cape Girardeau and Jackson, said that project should be completed on time.

Because the Center Junction project is just patching pavement and not adding new roadway, there isn’t an articulated completion date. But Holt said if the rain lets up for crews to get back to working at night, the project should be finished by the end of this week or early next week.

Whether the rain lets up is another story. Forecasts call for another rainy weekend.

Peterson said while they don’t archive Jackson rainfall totals, current readings may be skirting history if nearby Cape’s Girardeau’s rainfall is any indication.

“Looking at the normal values for this time of year, Cape Girardeau averages 3.02 inches of rain for the entire month,” she said. “So in three days, we’ve gotten essentially a month’s worth of rain for this time of year, so that’s pretty substantial on its own.”

And the Cape Girardeau and Jackson region, Peterson said, has avoided the worst of the rain farther west near places such a Poplar Bluff, Missouri, that have seen up to 17 inches of rain.

Even so, as of Tuesday morning, the 4.62 inches of total precipitation so far in Cape Girardeau this month were within a quarter-inch of ranking in the top 10 wettest Augusts on record.

tgraef@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3627

Pertinent address:

U.S. 61 and Interstate 55, Cape Girardeau, Mo.

U.S. 61 and East Main Street, Jackson, Mo.