The Skaneateles Town Board last week voted to approve the rebuilding of the Irish Road Bridge at a cost of approximately $150,000.
The single-lane bridge, built around 1924, is deteriorating due to old age with fatigue in the concrete, said Town Highway Superintendent Jim Card.
His department will tear out the bridge and build a new one made of aluminum and having two lanes instead of one, using a “bridge kit” similar to the one used for the repair of the Sheldon Road bridge in 2010, Card told the town board at its April 5 meeting.
The project, which has been anticipated for some time but not expected to occur so soon, will be paid for out of the Highway Department’s current budget surplus generated by the mild winter and the lack of expenditures on plowing and salting the roads, Card said.
He expects the project to take 30 to 45 days to complete, during which time the bridge will be closed and traffic detoured.
At the meeting, the town board also closed its continued public hearing on VSM Enterprises’ request to extend the consolidated water district and unanimously approved the request.
VSM Enterprises, LLC, is the company that owns Victory Sports Medicine, currently located at 791 W. Genesee St. The company last year purchased 99 acres of land two miles east of its current location to build a new facility and has been working to extend the consolidated water district out to the land.
The original public hearing on the issue has been extended twice due to the town board’s concerns over possible adverse effects the extension could have on water district No. 2 service. At the board’s March 15 meeting, it was decided that water line testing needed to be done during high-use times to ensure that extending the district would not adversely affect water pressure to the current consolidated district users.
Both tests were “consistent” that there were no “significant impacts” during peak times, Town Supervisor Terri Roney told the board on April 5. The only impact occurred during fireflow operations, so VSM Enterprises must come up with its own fireflow protection, Roney said.
Also at the meeting the board:
—Approved the expenditure of not more than $4,380 for a new lawn mower for the town cemetery superintendent, as well as the sale of the old mower.
—Approved the creation of a new deputy town highway superintendent position, and appointed Allan Wellington to the post. Wellington currently is a highway department foreman. There is no new salary or change of salary for the new position.
—Declared its Laker Limo 2010 10-passenger bus as surplus property and approved a bid opening for its sale. The opening will occur at 10 a.m. Tuesday, April 17.
—Voted unanimously to join the Town of Ulysses’ amicus brief to the state appellate courts in support of municipal home rule.
—Denied the request of Highway Superintendent Card to spend around $70,000 to purchase a tub grinder for scrap wood at the town transfer station. During discussion on the topic, board members evinced concerns over the grinder’s projected cost of operation, cost of fuel, possible maintenance and other issues. They agreed the cost was too expensive and they wanted more research done on both the benefits and detriments of such a purchase.
Jason Emerson is editor of the Skaneateles Press. He can be reached at [email protected].
