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Mill Street paving likely to temporarily snarl downtown traffic
By Justin Goble
Upcoming road work on one of Sylva’s main arteries may make downtown travel difficult in a few weeks.
According to town Public Works Director Dan Schaeffer, Mill Street will soon be closed for repaving as part of the ongoing renovations for the thoroughfare. Plans to improve the street have been in the works for almost a decade.
Schaeffer gave no starting date for the project, though he said he expects it to begin sometime in the next three weeks.
Work should last four to five days, Schaeffer said; contractor APAC expects two days for milling and two days for paving, weather permitting.
According to town Manager Jay Denton, workers will only close one lane at a time while milling and paving occurs.
“We’re hoping that the weather’s good, and the contractor’s fast,” Denton said. “We hope that it has minimal impact on our merchants, since it is the middle of tourist season, but we are cognizant of the fact that this may pose an inconvenience.”
Talk of renovating the thoroughfare has circulated for years since Sylva Partners in Renewal (now the Downtown Sylva Association) spearheaded the Main Street streetscape project in 1998. After Main Street revitalization was completed in 2001, SPIR members turned their attention to Mill Street.
In July of that year, Barge, Waggoner, Sumner and Cannon of Knoxville was chosen by SPIR to design and oversee construction of the project. The firm in February 2002 provided town board members a Mill Street master plan, which included replacing sidewalks; repaving the street; putting a pedestrian bridge over Scotts Creek to connect downtown and Poteet Park; and removing overhead utility lines.
The N.C. Department of Transportation green-lighted the project in February 2003, along with a $146,000 TEA-21 grant to help fund it.
Upgrades began in May with the installation of new sidewalks, curbs and guttering along Mill Street. Included was a “rain garden,” which Denton said uses special soil to filter water before it flows into Scotts Creek.
Denton said the delay between planning stages and actual construction was caused by an initial lack of interest from contractors.
“The project should have started last year,” he said. “It was delayed because when we went to bid the first time last fall, no one bid on it.” Denton indicated that the timing of the first bid offering may have handicapped the project.
“It was the same time as Hurricane Katrina, and contractors had a lot of work elsewhere,” he said.
The second time the project was bid, the town only received two proposals, but that was enough to fulfill statutory bidding requirements and allow the project to proceed, Denton said.
“The delay was really no one’s fault,” he said.
More renovations are planned after Mill Street’s repaving is complete.
Town board members unanimously voted in July to raise the Scotts Creek bridge project’s budget from $19,500 to $147,000. Board members also unanimously agreed to seek grant funds to help pay for the project. These funds will cover both engineering and installation of the bridge.
Instead of constructing a bridge on site, town officials are looking at a prefabricated truss bridge made by the Steadfast Bridge Co. of Alabama.
Denton said that, while he would like to see the utility lines put underground, the project is cost prohibitive at this time.
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