By Margie Doyle
Colin Huntemer, Senior Project Engineer for San Juan County Public Works Department overseeing the Mt. Baker Road project, gave some answers to Orcas Issues this week to questions about the ongoing project, widening Mt Baker Road and installing a trail along the road:
Schedule: The contract is for 90 working days beginning on Monday March 18, 2013. Working days are not charged for holidays or when critical path work was prevented due to weather, differing site conditions or significant changes to quantities of work. As of today the contractor must be physically complete by August 20, 2013 to avoid financial penalties.
Budget: This project is within budget. The annual road program for 2013 budgets $1.748m for the two County road projects, Mt Baker Rd Trail and Mt Baker Rd Improvements. Our projected construction costs are within the budget.
Compaction: We have not had any problems obtaining compaction for this project. We have a contract with a geotechnical testing consultant to perform regular compaction testing during the placement of aggregate.
Sidewalk: The original contract at bid award called for placement of a pervious cement concrete sidewalk along the south side of Mt Baker Road from North Beach Road to the entrance to Buck Park. It was later extended to the Crescent Beach preserve and thickened along the face of the embankment from 4 to 6 ½ inches.
Road Profile: During the course of construction we encountered significant drainage and utility conflicts near Madan Lane. To avoid expensive delays in relocating utilities, provide better conveyance in culverts and to elevate the road out of the adjacent wetlands we decided to raise the profile elevation of Mt Baker Road about one foot for about 200 feet either side of Madan Lane.
Colin Huntemer may be reached at (360) 370-0514 or colinh@sanjuanco.com
What was the ORIGINAL budget? It’s an interesting turn of phrase to say that this year’s expenditures are within “annual road program for 2013 budget.”