Bordentown City residents can anticipate more road paving work in the area this summer.
Municipal officials announced in May that the city applied for a competitive grant to the New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) and was awarded $240,000 plans to repave 2nd Street.
Once that grant was approved, Bordentown City officials offered to meet with residents and local businesses who would be potentially affected by the traffic flow during the paving.
Bordentown City locals were invited to informally discuss the project’s plans, and allow for questions and concerns to be discussed at the meeting with Bordentown City Commissioner Joe Myers on May 22 at the Carslake Community Center.
“The city has been working for the past few years to get NJDOT grants to do some repavement of roads,” Myers explained. “A few years ago, we had a grant to do Willow Street. Last year split into this year, we had a grant to do Burlington Street. What we are proposing with 2nd Street is [to work on it] from Crosswicks Street to Bank Street, which will be the next infrastructure project.”
Myers reported that the 2nd Street project is planned to include road repaving, striping and concrete repairs. City officials said that part of the planned concrete repairs would include ADA improvements, curbing and intersections.
Unlike the extensive work that was completed on Burlington Street in 2018, Myers said that the anticipated project on 2nd Street is less significant in terms of underground projects.
“The scope [for 2nd Street] is much smaller,” Myers said. “It’s just a resurfacing and streetscape project, which means there’s no below-ground work. There’s no work on utilities. It’s just repaving of the roads, doing some work on curbs – every intersection will have ADA compliant ramps and streetscape components like that.”
Officials said that depending on construction bids for the project, work is anticipated to be done within the boundaries of Bank Street to Crosswicks Street.
Myers reported that construction bids call for a 60-day construction schedule for design plans to get finalized and submitted to the state for approval; plans are publicly advertised and contractors submit competitive bids; bids are evaluated by the city’s construction manager and the lowest responsible bidder is recommended to the city commissioners.
“Unlike Burlington Street, this is a 60-day construction duration,” he said. “Burlington Street was about 180 days with no change orders. The challenge with Burlington Street was that there was a school and church there that we knew had there [in addition to] underground work that was done there.”
Myers also explained that a common concern for residents that approached him about the project was in regards to its work schedule potentially overlapping with the city’s annual Halloween parade in the Fall, which traverses through 2nd Street as part of the festivity.
Given the event’s prominence to city residents, Myers said that the municipality is contingent on completion of the road work prior to the event.
“In terms of the schedule, 2nd Street is a heavily trafficked street for the city’s Halloween parade, so the commitment we made is that we would be able to start and complete the project before Halloween,” he said. “The working goal right now is that we would start construction at the end of the Summer.”
Officials also said that another main concern for the project among residents and businesses was road closures. Myers said that he was approached with concerns regarding closures to the road that could potentially negate deliveries or access to traverse their homes.
Although Myers said that portions of the road would be closed off at times during the project’s construction, the municipality plans to never close the road completely and to allow as much access as possible.
“Similar to what we did with Willow Street and Burlington Street, we are committed in terms of road closures – that the road would never be closed, will always be accessible, and especially at the end of the day at 3 p.m. when the construction is done, the road will be turned back over,” he explained.
Funding for the project will include a total budget of $433,000 based upon engineering estimates as well as NJDOT’S grant money along with a $193,000 contribution from the municipality’s capital budget, according to officials.
Officials said that planned construction costs are estimated at approximately $376,000 and planned engineering costs are estimated at approximately $57,000.