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Downtown Construction Project

Phase 5 is now under construction!  Watch the Video.  The phasing map has been revised and the latest version can be seen below.  The Street Department along with the contractor, Simon & Taylor, have started their work.  Expect road closers and delays while driving through downtown.  Each phase is expected to last 2-3 months depending on weather.  The Flash images below show the scheduled phasing plan.  The Utility & Streets will be handled first on each street.  This will usually consist of removing the existing paving, replacing all water & sewer lines, and adding new street pavement.  Then the sidewalk phase will take place on areas that have had the utility & street work completed. The sidewalk work will consist of replacing the sidewalks with new ones and adding any new City landscape areas.  If you have more interest in the project please contact KSA Engineering at (936) 637-6061.

Erratum:  "CALDER SQ" should read "COTTON SQ"

Click here to view All City of Lufkin Construction Projects broken down by percent complete, engineering firm, cost, estimated completion date, etc.

Unexpected problems responsible for many of the delays for the downtown project.

   The City of Lufkin’s ongoing downtown street and utilities improvement project is about 22 percent complete-if progress is judged solely on the amount of money spent and the number of contract days worked, that is.  The installation of new sidewalks, lighting and additional landscaping currently stands at about 13 percent complete using the same criteria.

   The City's estimates of actual progress, however, indicate the contractor responsible for reconstructing a nine-block area of city sidewalks, streets, storm drainage, sewer and water lines is going to miss the scheduled September 2004 completion date by at least two months and maybe more. 

   For instance.  Workers will run across water and sewer lines that have been capped off, don’t seem to connect to anything or weren’t laid out as depicted on older city maps.  Work has to stop while engineers figure what’s connected to what, or what isn’t connected at all.

   Concrete foundations from buildings that were torn down decades ago are also being discovered, and have to be torn out in order to continue.  With about 150 years of Lufkin history buried beneath downtown streets, workers and engineers alike are finding new problems almost daily.

   Poor soil conditions have also been a major concern.  Engineers expected some problems with the soil-early testing found some of the problems-but didn’t expect anything like the extensive problems they’ve found when concrete streets were ripped up.  In some cases, the “bad” soil has to be removed entirely and replaced with soil that can hold up to the construction being placed on top of it.

   Rain has caused headaches for Simon Traylor & Sons.  The City has counted an actual of 84 rain days since the project began, this when the contractor only requested 134 rain days for the entire 540-day construction schedule.  The delays, combined with the soil problems and the unexpected maze of old underground utilities, means the scheduled September 2004 completion date likely won’t happen.

   The newly-projected November 2004 completion date probably won’t happen either.  Unless things go really well in the other phases, the City doesn't think they’ll meet their contract.  The City has made some adjustments to try and overcome that, but know they are going to run into more unknown situations and weather delays… so we look for that (two-month period) to grow.

   Although slow, progress has been made, however.  Now that a portion of Burke Avenue has a driving surface down, brick-style sidewalks installed and antique-style light fixtures erected, the city is working with the contractor to speed up construction of the other streets.