Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
The Uniontown sidewalk-extension project has been approved and pushed back to next year.
Originally planned for this summer, the work to extend sidewalks to each end of the town limits was approved Sept. 13 by the Washington State Department of Transportation.
With its approval, the state designated a change to the planned pedestrian lighting which calls for narrowing the focus of the LED fixtures.
Uniontown and its engineer, Munir Daud, will now go out to bid Nov. 1 for work next spring.
The delay was due to the wait for the project to be entered into the state transportation improvement database.
“Since it’s federal money, it has a lot of rules on it,” said Daud. “The Eastern division of the state highway department is unusually difficult to work with.”
“They’ve hassled us all summer,” said Brian Davies, Uniontown town councilman, who is the liaison for the project.
Al Gilson, spokesman for WSDOT Eastern Region, said they followed standard procedure.
“This (project) is what our department does on a regular basis,” Gilson said.
The work will extend sidewalks to the Dahmen Barn at one end and to the Rolling Hills subdivision at the other.
On Montgomery Street/Highway 195 the sidewalk will run north from Owen Street to the Dahmen Barn and south from Frank Street to the southern town limits. The project is to be funded by a $306,000 grant from Washington’s Transportation Improvement Board and $60,000 from Palouse Regional Transportation Organization.
The concrete sidewalks will be laid down within the existing right-of-way of Highway 195.
Total length of new sidewalk will be .5401 mile.
The state highway department estimates the work to take three weeks.
Daud estimates the work will take between four and eight weeks.
Garth Meyer is a former Whitman County Gazette reporter.
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