Downtown roadwork on pace for October completion

Construction on 13th Ave. and Illinois is moving forward on schedule.

Work scheduled for this week included installation by the electric department of loops for the right hand turn lane for south bound 13th Ave. These loops detect when a car is present in the lane. The city plans to pour concrete for the westbound lanes on the north side of Illinois today and tomorrow.

Next week the remaining portion of 13th Ave. south of Illinois will be poured. After that, the city plans to complete work on the 14th Ave. intersection.

The project is set to wrap up in mid October.

"We're in pretty good shape right now," said public services director John Hehnke.

While the last of the new signal loops that go in the pavement will be installed over the next several days, the city is also working on wiring for the signals as well.

"Then we'll have the department of roads come in and do the programming for the new traffic signals," Hehnke said.

This $711,000 project, which began in late June, involves removing all the pavement, curbs, gutters and sidewalks and replacing the roadway with concrete pavement on Illinois from 13th to 14th Avenues including both of those intersections.