Recently, TRPC announced that the State is poised to award $950,000
for the Gap Project elevated crossing of Martin Way (and $805,000 for
the Yelm Prairie Trail). Both are still pending approval). I posed a
few clarifying questions to Thera Black, Senior Transportation
Planner at TRPC. Her reply, which she said was OK to post around,
follows:

>This funding will be used for the grade-separated structure
>over Martin Way. We have full funding for the bridge. This
>grant enables us to shift $950,000 of Baird's earmark that we were
>going to have to use for Martin Way back onto the Pacific Avenue
>crossing. My understanding is that we'll be going to bid for
>construction this winter (sometime soon) with construction slated
>for spring/summer 2008. This time next year the bridge should be
>complete.
>
>The at-grade crossing [the City of Olympia is making -LL] is nearly
>complete. The refuge island is in place and the County is just
>waiting for the in-pavement lighting to arrive to complete the
>install. I've heard from several people that the island is already
>being used.
>
>Once the Martin Way bridge gets to the contract stage we'll shift
>our planning attention to the Pacific Avenue crossing. We've had
>some preliminary discussions with Capital Development Company (CDC)
>and DeTrays Manufactured Homes regarding alignment and grade
>questions. We've pretty well resolved questions about the segment
>between I-5 and Pacific Avenue. It'll be at-grade along the old
>alignment, ramping up for the Pacific Avenue crossing behind JoAnn's
>Fabrics. Now we'll have to reach agreement on the alignment through
>Paul DeTray's property and the last CDC parcel adjacent to the
>Woodland Trail so we can talk ROW acquisition needs and costs.
>
>In terms of funding for Pacific Avenue I can tell you with some
>confidence that we don't have sufficient funds to complete
>everything but I don't know by how much yet (except that we're
>$950,000 closer than we were before!). We need final bids for
>Martin Way plus estimates for ROW acquisition south of Pacific
>Avenue before we can get a ballpark estimate of the shortfall. I'm
>sure that we have enough to complete the I-5 south / Pacific Avenue
>crossing design and construction of the permanent trail between I-5
>and Pacific Avenue. We probably have enough to acquire the
>remaining ROW and some of the remaining construction. With
>construction and ROW costs as upwardly volatile as they are, though,
>I really can't say just how much more we'll need yet. Let's say
>it's probably more than $500k but less than... $2 million (how's
>that for a wide margin?!)
>
>The state agency we haven't yet tapped but will for this funding is
>the Interagency Committee for Outdoor Recreation (fy 2009 funding).
>And of course, we'll continue to approach Senator Murray.
>
>Hopefully this answers your questions. I'll be back in the office
>next week and will unclog the voice/email boxes. Apologies for the
>inconvenience. We're down in Palm Springs, soaking up some sun and
>sweltering in the unusually hot (mid-90s) weather. Talk about an
>unfriendly environment for cyclists and pedestrians! They seem to
>have more onstreet facilities for golf carts than cyclists or peds.

--
- Larry Leveen

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