maplewood city manager today we're at the maplewood public works facility on the city hall campus and talking with our public works director city engineer michael thompson on the  english highway thirty six interchange so welcome michael jim it's going to be here to talk about the project i look forward to talking about some of the details and i think the public and citizens wall will get a lot out of this today let's kind of start from the beginning  and what's it entailed when the project is mainly focused along highway thirty six right in the area of hazelwood street in english street and it is right now there's a traffic signal at english street i think everybody's where everybody knows about that a lot of backups a lot of accidents cell what this project will do it will put a bridge over the highway were english street is all it will it will be a grade separated interchange so a diamond interchange type diet and what that will do it will allow that through traffic to move reduce accidents many people may not know but this is ranked within the top one hundred intersections on trunk highways for crashes so we do have a real problem out here that needs to be fixed the i know you're heading west you know coming up over the hill and know you can look ahead and see the green light but still there's traffic backed up there and almost stopped and the lights been green for a long time so i presume that this has resulted in quite a few accidents this is a very high area for a crash is on men dots lists ways it's ranked ninety one in this state so there's a real problem out there of crashes like you said those backups people see a green light but they don't see the traffic stopped right in front of them so nearly you know every day or every other day you can see some type of an accident you know if you're coming off from english no you can almost get a full day's beard waiting for the stop light to change at times and so it gets a little bit troublesome to the people moving around in the public works department we get a lot of calls saying you know we're sitting at this signal for so long so this project will really help the local traffic the maplewood citizens get you know on and off highway thirty six much quicker and more efficiently and the main part of the project is removing that traffic signal in english street and putting a bridge over and putting in what's called a diamond interchange so that's going to help reduce accidents improve safety also help with the local access right now people are waiting a long times to get through that signal so safety mobility local access there there's a whole lot of things that will occur also there are some other local improvements like on county road b by highway sixty one and a connection from the local neighborhood to jarvis avenue and then you know your basic pavement repair that leads to the next question you know it's it state highway what so what's the reasoning behind that is it is a little unique it is a trunk highway the city you wanted to step in because we were concerned about the local access and making sure our citizens had proper access the businesses like mattress factory truck utilities menards that they had good access so you know if if the city didn't step in it could have been likely that the signal would have been removed and the access would have just gone away and the streets closed off well that's a that's a heck of a long way the from the white bear on the east to sixty one on the west would be the only way of somehow getting into all those businesses and other properties yeah that so it's a long distance either way because as part of this project you know hazelwood street atlanta extreme all those local accesses are being closed so english street was a good middle point between white bear and highway sixty one i recall that you you really went out of your way how many public meetings did you have with the folks in the neighborhood we had about eight open house meetings larger meetings and then we had a few smaller meetings to talk about the road connection noise walls sound berms but we did we were very involved with the neighborhood we had to citizen committees put together one of the more contentious issues was how to make a local connection to the job that nobody nobody wants to become extra busy right and correct we had three petitions you know nobody wanted the connection a certain way so we got everybody at the table and we tried to sort through that and i think we came to a good compromise and so this has gone through about four years of public the other side came up with a different noise dampening effect and i thought that was really kind of interesting could you kind of explain that a little bit further yeah so with any of these projects we have to look to see if sound mitigation is needed wall well what we have is on the south side of thirty six parallel to sharon avenue and there will be a noise wall but on the north side adjacent to viking drive those residents they didn't want to twenty foot tall wall right at their front yard essentially it's very small so one of the the ideas they had and they they worked with the city we came up with what it could look like is a landscape earthen berm saul it's about a six foot  berm trees so it's it's it's a better walk they think than just a twenty foot tall wall in reality you know the noise was there before the walls where the berm goes in and  hopefully with the elimination of that interchange that stoplight that hopefully the the traffic moves a little bit more efficiently and hopefully quieter so you know i at least to me it seems like kind of a win win anyway with with one the neighborhood getting what they wanted whether it be a wall or a berm and that least they want to have the squealing tires in the brakes and stuff like that to contend with i agree the braking the acceleration that does make up quite a bit of the noise currently on the further end of thirty six where sixty one comes in that's always been kind of a headache to and i know you really went out of your way to be sort of innovative and and to come up with some real interesting solutions with that problem so could you talk a little bit more about that highway sixty one and county ro and intersection there is a front road that goes to an r so essentially you have three legs coming into that intersection and there's backups accidents a lot of confusion there so what we want to do is move that frontage road further to the east on county road be and close it because right now it's really close to highway sixty one so we've been working with the gas station owner the neighbors there ramsey county golf course our golf course so we came up with a solution where you know we can provide something that's allows traffic to move through there efficiently you don't get the back light you know isn't really that long and second is people can get jammed up because of traffic coming in on conny road b and actually i've seen where people have blocked sixty one because the haven't been able to complete their left hand turn yeah and that's exactly what we're trying to fix here like he said it just gets jammed up in what we're doing by moving that front edge and back is not problem believing that  station convenience store then that's that's right there is that part of the plan we're moving the front row that's there currently the front road would go on the other side of the gas station in a gas station in the residential property but actually the gas station could have been an island then yeah so we're like i said we're working with the gas station we don't know exactly what's going to happen with the gas station but right now we have easements that allow us to build the road and we think we can do it in a manner that that supports all the parties involved i know you've you've you've spent an enormous amount of time working with the neighbors there working with menards to try to make this a lot safer interchange and and you know i guess nothing's perfect but i think you went as far as you possibly can go is to to make a difficult situation all but better as we move on let's take mile and record the information the amount of material the trucks are programmed for is specific to each smaller ice event based on current and extended forecast this helps reduce the amount of salt which we use which saves money and minimizes impacts to the environment we have also installed chains on plow trucks which provide traction on demand when conditions warrant this provides saying is a proactive maintenance approach it is a chemical freezing point depressant that is applied in advance of the storm it is a brine solution liquid that is spot applied to areas such as birds ducks steep hills is the process of adding liquid brine solution to the dry salt as it is applied in has many benefits such as lowering salts effective working temperature and jump starting the melting process it also helps reduce cost and environmental impacts by preventing loss of dry salt from ballance or scatter because it sticks to the pavement prevent a program is in the early stages but we thought proactive approach to the snow and ice control rather than a reactive approach is the right path forward and providing better service to the traveling public are pretty wet program as shown very good results so far we will be installing the system on the remaining eight trucks over time if you have questions about the public works program please call us at six five one two four nine two four zero zero ok well michael really an interesting clip on the air crews worked when we had the scene it's really moving our department forward being proactive rather than reactive so we think this is the right direction and writing better service to the public during the winter months and say for services to work now let's go back to thirty six and anguish in their change who designed this project what does it look like what was the process you used in going through you know this basically a complete rebuild not only thirty six but also down there at sixty one also the design process there's a number of steps and because it's such a large project you know there's a few thousand pages of point and sell for this the city goes out and hires a consultant because you know we don't want to hire the full time staff just for a temporary job so the consultants put together the plans through a collaborative process with the staff min dot has him put it was a partnership with ramsey county ramsey washington that watershed district the ramsey county parks ramsey county regional rail so really there's a number of parties that have input on to what the project will look like this city not only the staff but we took the project to the community design review board and some of the other boards and commissions for their input you know herculean task for into work with all the the different entities and i got to congratulate you i'm keeping your cool and and working through the whole process you mention a couple  thousand pages of documents on this what's this project going to cost when it's all said and will the construction cost is estimated at about sixteen point five million dollars the traveling public so i'll just quickly give a couple scheduling items the contractor hopes tentatively to start in mid march the first part of the project would be that intersection we talked about the county road the highway sixty one interchange they would intersection they would have to start that was one of their first items and how all that work completed by mid may and then they would move up and do some work on jarvis avenue no but the important thing is they can't move to do any major work on highway thirty six that would close that down until they finish some businesses can have access residents can access but saw where traffic can free flow through and then also all businesses can and can access both sides north and south of thirty six from the new entertained before that during the closure the businesses and residents will have other access points that will be signed with the tour and i presume that all be signed and stuff so you know like i suppose even seventy five days you know fight for the original mattress factory and and some of these other businesses is going to  r relationships with with them and one of their important things is you know the access and the visibility during the project and after the project so they like what the access is after the project with the new and really help improve their business i would think absolutely redevelop in the cord or we think that's going to be a big motivator but again during the project that's going to be one of our number one priorities is working with businesses to make trail bridge that would be taken down and replaced over the summer also during the same time period then yes yes so that's a good mention because that will be taken down and replaced with a pedestrian style bridge if you've noticed that bridge currently it's a pinch point for thirty six so you can't have shoulders you can't do much so that is being replaced as part of the project i'm never comfortable driving that portion there because you know you really can't see that far you can see the green lights in the red lights and stuff but when you get down in there it's it's a little tense so how are these costs apportioned then michael for the the seventeen million dollar project the majority of the cost is covered through federal funding and it's called the stimulus funding this isn't stimulus this is the s t p program so the federal money is about eight million dollars and then state money is roughly five million and then the remainder is a portion between city and county watershed and all basically what's the cost of our share of the total cost of our share is roughly in the three to three and a half million dollar range and some of that is build back to some of the other agencies through some of the coopt of agreements we have some of it is proposed to be assessed as part of the project for the improvement and some of it is you know our state aid funding where we get an advance and that's paid through gas tax and other mechanisms and then utility funds so really with this project we minimize the need general tax levy dollars that we've spent and we've really looked at other sources grant funding for example we've got a transportation economic development fund ted funding through deed of one million dollars so that's one example of how we've gone out and try to fund the project and i think it's important for the people to know that you know these projects are not free you know somebody's got to pay think you and your staff have done a tremendous job on this michael and i just can't tell you how pleased i am with with the progress you've made on this that you've worked with all these different partners and different personalities bringing it all together so it's real kudos for you and and your team as we wrap this up working people get more information lite see the best place to go is the  there's a link called trunk highway thirty six english street interchange and it's under project correct ok so that has the layout it has all the technical information all the history of the open house meeting so whether you're looking for general information or technical information it's all there the feasibility study but i did want to know before we end here is we will continue to have open house meetings were hoping february or march of this year to have another open house meeting once the contractors on board and to continue weekly meetings with the business owners and residents will get that set up but again you know if anybody listening to the show has any suggestions you know we're still open for suggestions or listening in on how things can be done perhaps a little bit better but again we're all ears and we just look to work with the public on the important part is go fault sense that that this project can change large amounts i think the tweaking trying to make things better for for the businesses and the people in the area but this projects going forward and it's going to start march of this year and be completed what's what's completion date again on this project the completion date the substantial completion date is the end of two thousand and thirteen so the contractor is tentatively program to start mid march of two thousand and thirteen so the brunt of the project should be done by the end of this year twenty fourteen would only have minor carry over work maybe some landscaping punch list items but really the public can expect a majority of the project to be done at the end of two thousand and three i think it's important to know that you're certainly willing to work with businesses property owners in the area but this project is moving forward and so there can be some tweaking done but as far as major changes to the project we have let the bids on this we have awarded the bids to bed is actually proposed to be awarded tonight at the city councilman i am getting ahead of myself so and let's get this thing done as quickly as possible right jim thanks for the kind comments and again if anybody listening or the public out there wants to call has suggestions or just wants to provide some input call us a public works six five one