Gage County Board approves road plans, receives update on Pickrell Bridge

BEATRICE – The Gage County Board has approved the county’s new one-and-six-year road and bridge improvement program.  It includes 36 projects the county hopes to complete in the first year of the plan. Supervisors moved one project from the long-range part of the schedule, to the first year list, at the urging of board member Emily Haxby.  That’s the Clatonia to DeWitt Road.

"Three roads were at that 20 to 22 year lifespan. Two of them are going to get taken care of with this grant we've gotten...the last one was the Clatonia to DeWitt Road which I was trying to get with those other ones."

Haxby said moving the project to the first year of the schedule would emphasize its priority as a potential grant-funded project. The supervisors approved adding it to the first-year schedule, on a 7-0 vote. Haxby says the hope, with grant support, would be to widen the road slightly and include better shoulders.

Highway Superintendent Mark Kuhnke said there are several projects that would replace older bridges with culverts or concrete box culverts.  "We have about twelve culverts coming for this coming year. Five of them should be delivered the end of this month, the beginning of September. We have one on the ground near Blue Springs and Wymore. We still plan on getting these six done yet this year. And then the other six that we just awarded to Ace-Eaton two weeks ago, we hope to get those in the first of the year. Two of those projects in the spring will be for the Christ Lutheran Road, South 25th, just south of Highway 41 in anticipation of the mill and overlay project."

An 18-minute public hearing on the plan drew no public feedback, Wednesday morning.  Gage County is yet to hear on the status of a grant application through the Bridge Improvement Program.

Kuhnke gave an update on the progress to replace the bridge at the east edge of Pickrell, with a triple concrete box culvert.  "They were just finishing digging the diversion channel on the east side, and had the tubes placed on the southeast corner for a road access for them to get to the bottom of the box culverts. There were some difficulties with a lot of fiber in-ground. We were able to miss everything. They had standbys while they were digging the diversion channel, from multiple fiber networks. JJK was excavating for the box culvert. They had another foot or two of finishing down there. I would estimate they'll be formed up by the end of this week, possibly pouring the foundation for the box by end of next week, if not early the following week."

Other work on the one-year plan is some concrete repairs to Locust Road south of Beatrice…which connects U.S. Highways 136 and 77. A major resurfacing project along East Sycamore Road and South 23rd, near Big Indian Recreation area is on the one-year plan.

Another road in need of attention is the Rockford Road, from U.S. 136 to the entrance to the recreation area. Other parties in that process include NDOT and the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission.