Update given on Minnesota 60 project

Talk about it

WORTHINGTON — Community leaders and transportation officials discussed the Minnesota 60 construction project on Friday, learning that it’s still unclear how pedestrians will fare with the highway’s expansion near Worthington’s Union Pacific Railroad bridge.

Bob Williams, the senior professional engineer at the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s Windom office, reported the bridge is still a work in progress, scheduled to be replaced in 2011-2012 to accommodate the four-lane highway, though he said, “We’re in the process of working with the company to look at the railroad bridge issue. We’re looking at something that may be done sooner than we expected.

New Ulm has a lighted pedestrian underpass, but the bridge’s high water table makes a similar option difficult.

Williams said designs for phase one and two of the Bigelow to Worthington four-lane expansion have been completed, and bids for construction are on pace to be let in spring 2010. According to a MnDOT document revised this month, the project will be completed in the following phases:

* Phase 1: Bigelow bypass to Paul Avenue, construction in 2010-2011.

* Phase 2: Paul Avenue to Nobles County 35, construction in 2011-2012.

* Phase 3: Nobles County 35 to Interstate 90, including replacement of the bridge, design decisions mostly complete, construction slated for 2012-2013.

Three roundabouts will also be installed, including one where Nobles County 35 intersects with Minnesota 60.

Traffic will be detoured in 2011, but the hope is that workers will have enough of Phase 2 completed by the end of 2011 to restore normal traffic flow, Williams said.

The four-lane expansion from Windom to St. James is scheduled to be completed in three segments, beginning in 2013, or when the Bigelow to Iowa state line portion is complete, and continuing until 2018. Rebecca Arndt, the public affairs coordinator for MnDOT district 7, said funding for that project, estimated at about $90 million, should be available.

In other business, members of the Highway 60 Corporation voted to re-elect Steve Schnieder as president, John Baerg as vice president and Darlene Macklin as secretary of the corporation for another one-year term.

Tags: news, worthington, minnesota60