Glenvar Rt. 460 widening construction could start in November
Almost a year after utility lines were relocated, construction could start in November to widen Rts. 460-11 in Glenvar.
DLB out of Hillsville was the apparent low bidder after a second round of bids were opened Aug. 25, Virginia Department of Transportation officials said. Nothing will be definite until the contractor’s bonds and other requirements are thoroughly checked, VDOT people say, but they anticipate the Commonwealth Transportation Board to act on the pending bid package analysis in October.
A virtual view looking west of what Rts. 460-11 – West Main Street in Glenvar – will look like after the widening project is completed. Fort Lewis Baptist Church is at the upper right. VDOT photo
If all goes as expected, work could begin before winter sets in. Don’t look for massive equipment and tons of earth to start moving yet, though. Mike Russell and Robbie Williams, engineers in the Salem District office, said Tuesday work would probably stop for the winter in when temperatures drop, and resume in the spring.
“You should see some construction start in November. Utilities have to be relocated, above and beyond what you have already seen,” explained Russell, who is assistant district administrator in charge of preliminary engineering for VDOT’s Salem District.
He added that because the highway will be in roughly the same area, only widened on each side, “We will be able to do a lot of curb and gutter work out of traffic. It’s not going to be as bad as it could be,” he added.
Widening will be done in three phases, he said:
• Salem City Limits to Garman next summer;
• Garman to the Virginia State Police Headquarters next construction season, between April and November 2011, and
• State Police headquarters to the Fort Lewis Fire Department and on.
Speaking of inconvenience to drivers during construction on West Main compared to blasting and planned construction to widen Rt. 221 in the Cave Spring area, Russell quipped “The 460 project will be more complicated, but the Rt. 221 project will be more painful.”
Construction plans for the 2.1-mile stretch of West Main Street starting just west of the Salem City Line and running west to Technology Drive where the four-lane divided highway begins were on hold since spring, after the first bidding process was challenged.
“There were some discrepancies, so VDOT rejected all bids and re-advertised after 90 days,” said Williams, construction engineer for VDOT’s Salem District. He and Russell gave an overview of road construction expected to start in the next year and answered questions Tuesday at the Salem-Glenvar Rotary Club meeting at Richfield Retirement’s Recovery Care Center.
Williams said DLB’s bid was just under $23 million, which was about the same as that awarded by the Commonwealth Transportation Board in December 2009 to General Excavation from Warrenton, according to the Projects and Studies page on VDOT’s website.
Williams and Russell showed two 3-foot-by-4-foot virtual views of what the completed Rts. 460-11 would look like. The current three-lane section would be expanded to four lanes of divided highway with a raised median and turn lanes at strategic locations, such as Atlas Cold Storage where scores of tractor-trailers enter the warehouse area each day, carrying foods bound for Kroger stores in the mid-Atlantic region.
Plans call for sidewalks to tie into existing pedestrian walks around Fort Lewis Elementary School, and a paved shoulder for people walking and bicycle traffic.
The two engineers also gave details about the Rt. 221 project, and earmarked federal funds that will enable VDOT to extend the truck-climbing lane on I-81 to connect between Ironto in western Roanoke County and Christiansburg Mountain.
The latter is a $75-million contract that will be both designed and built by the contractor.
Truck climbing lanes, Rt. 221 widening and Rt. 460 widening al have 2013 completiion dates, Williams said.
“There’s a lot of work coming up,” he added. “This region has done well in this regard.”
He said plans for Rt. 221 work had been sitting on a shelf, ready to go. When other projects came in under expected costs, VDOT was prepared to go.
