Progress Parkway Pedestrian Walkway Engineering Plans Presented To County Commission

Jeremy Manning of Smith and Company Engineering brought copies of plans for the pedestrian bridge to span Progress Parkway, linking Ste. Genevieve County Community Center and Progress Sports Complex with the new River Rapids Waterpark to last Thursday’s Ste. Genevieve County Commission meeting. The plans also include an elevator shaft.

Manning reviewed the plans with the commissioners and community center executive director Brad Arnold.

The project is complicated by the need for the elevator to make the walkway handicapped-accessible. The Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) had approved a plan including wheelchair ramps, but building those ramps turned out to be impractical, making an elevator necessary. MoDOT, however, has never actually dealt with an elevator before, which complicates the process.

Manning expressed hopes that while the entire project had to be bid as one package the elevator might be funded separately. Presiding Commissioner Garry Nelson later checked with MoDOT personnel, and found that this was not possible.

“We can’t pay separately,” Nelson said. “It’s all under one grant. I understand their position. We put in for a grant for all of this, so we can’t start taking stuff out of the project.”

The Federal Highway Administration will fund the Transportation Alternative Project (TAP) grant the county received to pay for 75 percent of the project. The bridge and replacement of the city walking trail, damaged during community center construction projects, was estimated at $310,000. The agency would not approve breaking out parts of the project.

See complete story in the January 22 edition of the Herald.

“