Benton Courier - Special meeting called on Bryant water project

    After a lengthy discussion Tuesday about the status of the Forest Cove Area watershed project, Bryant City Council called for a special 6 p.m. meeting Thursday to meet with all parties involved to speed up construction of the Arkansas 5 bridge.
   The meeting will be held at the Boswell Municipal Complex in Bryant.
   Richard Penn, Public Works director for the city, said that FTN and Associates is scheduling June 23 as the completion date of a new study involving the area south of Interstate 30, but councilmen asked to speed up the date so that the project can be completed before the new school year starts. The Arkansas 5 bridge is directly in front of Collegeville Elementary School and students are expected to return to classes in late August.
   Because several councilmen expressed the importance of completing the Arkansas 5 project with the watershed study, a special meeting was called for Thursday in which both McClelland and FTN representatives, as well as an other parties involved, could join the discussions.
   In January 2007, the city hired FTN, an environmental consulting firm in Little Rock that specializes in solving problems related to the environment, to conduct a project to help relieve flooding issues in certain neighborhoods.
   The project was designed to help identify problems and determine what should be done to improve stormwater drainage in Forest Cove, Sunset Meadows, West Pointe, Springhill Acres, Springhill Manor, Sherwood Estates and Northridge subdivisions.
   The final report from FTN was presented to the council in December, but the city has since studied funding options.
   The April 3 severe storms caused major flooding issues in numerous areas of the city, which led residents to express their concern about stormwater drainage during an April 10 council meeting.
   At that council meeting, Mayor Larry Mitchell and aldermen declared an emergency situation and proceeded with the implementation of certain projects in FTN’s plans. McClelland Consulting Engineers Inc. of Little Rock also was hired in April to prepare a plan to replace culverts on the Arkansas 5 North bridge near Larry’s Pizza and area that has been been determined to have the most significant impact on the overall watershed project.
   Dan Beranek with McClelland said a majority of the redesign is completed and the project should be ready to advertise for bids in June. Approval still must be obtained from the state Highway and Transportation Department.
   Bryant Public Works Director Richard Penn has told the council numerous times that the most important piece of the entire project is removing the current culverts on the Arkansas 5 bridge and replacing them with larger culverts.
   However, Penn said it is important to study the impact a redesigned bridge would have on Hurricane Creek. He noted that he talked to FTN representatives about extending their watershed study from Interstate 30 to Hurricane Creek. On May 8, the council approved allowing FTN to extend the watershed study.
   "Taking out Arkansas 5 bridge is basically the control point," Penn said. "Right now we are studying to see what the effect is of water down stream. We are going to go ahead with all the detailed information, detailed design work, the bids, the whole program [with McClelland] and at the same time we are doing this [FTN] study. If we find that it is suitable and protects the public, that we know that we are OK, then we'll go ahead and proceed with this work at one time. But if we don't have an acceptable answer for down stream, south of the Interstate 30 at this point, I don't see how we can do anything at Arkansas 5."
   Penn said McClelland would also look at different ways to reroute traffic when construction is set to begin with the Arkansas 5 bridge. He explained that the rerouting of traffic would close off the section of the highway near the bridge for up to three or four weeks during the construction of the redesign.
   Penn and Beranek said they looked at several options for keeping at least one lane of traffic open on the bridge instead of rerouting traffic, but stated several times that it would not be possible. However, several councilmen have asked all parties to look at other solutions to constructing the redesign without rerouting traffic.
   Other agenda items slated for the Thursday meeting include discussions about stormwater issues involving Midtown Bryant and Stoneybrook subdivisions.

< Prev		Next >

[ Back ]