Thursday, July 6, 2023–7:42 p.m.

-David Crowder, WRGA News-

August 1 has been set as the preconstruction date for the Second Avenue widening project, and the City of Rome water and sewer department is getting ready for utility work that will be done as part of the roadwork.

The Georgia Department of Transportation has awarded a $26.2 million project to C.W. Matthews Contracting Company for the work, which will include the addition of medians and turn lanes at intersections along the route between the Oostanaula River and Turner McCall Boulevard.

Two lanes will run in each direction separated by a median that allows for turn lanes into the Atrium Health Floyd campus and Heritage Park.

The split in the road at the intersection will be eliminated. Traffic from downtown will be directed to Martha Berry Boulevard or to turn lanes for Turner McCall or Shorter Avenue.

According to Rome Water and Sewer Director Mike Hackett, the city will undertake at least some of the utility work.

“We will have a new water main that will have to be installed,” he told members of the water and sewer committee on Thursday.  “We’ll also have some sewer work that will have to be done and we will have some flood control work for the Second Avenue culvert.”

Hackett said the city will likely do the sewer work and the box culvert while letting the DOT’s contractor do the work on the water line.

The cost of the culvert is estimated at $300,000 to $400,000 while the sewer work will be $30,000 or $40,000.

“It’s basically only about 400 feet of pipe,” Hackett said. “I think we can get in and do it without being disruptive.”

The water line is expected to cost just under $1 million.

City to pay for manhole cover work as part of Shorter Avenue resurfacing project

Another major GDOT project is the resurfacing of Shorter Avenue and Alabama Highway from the hospital in Rome to Ga. 100 in Coosa.

According to John Boyd, assistant director of Rome’s water and sewer division, that project also includes some costs for the city.

There are 152 manhole covers that will have to be raised to the level of the road once the new surface is down.

Approximately $533,000 has been budgeted for the manhole cover work and an agreement with GDOT was approved late last year by the Rome City Commission.