WESTFIELD – Work to relieve traffic congestion and street flooding at the intersection of North Elm and Notre Dame streets is finally underway after a number of legal issues delayed the start of construction.
City Engineer Mark Cressotti said that the $4.4 million project to widen the roadway and add dedicated left turn lanes, was expected to start earlier this summer, but that it was delayed because of issues with securing legal access to property and with the financing.
The project is being funded through a $10 million bond approved by the City Council several years ago and used to correct drainage problems and repave Arch Road. The city attempted to sell more of that bond to finance the North Elm Street improvements, but the bond companies balked because that intersection was not specifically include in the scope of work to be completed with the bond money.
The City Council voted earlier this summer to modify the language of the bond, adding the North Elm Street, Notre Dame Street improvement to the bond package.
Cressotti said that the contractor, Baltazar Construction of Ludlow, has also changed the sequence of work. Initially the city notified residents that the contractor would begin the project working at night. Cressotti said that work, originally slated from the beginning of September, will now be done in October.
“The contractor will be working day along the Mestek property (on the west side of North Elm Street) installing new drainage and widening the roadway,” Cressotti said Friday. “North Elm Street will be down to three lanes.”
“The goal, before the work shuts down for winter, is to have the road widened, to have the new drainage in place, to have a base coat of asphalt down and to have a new traffic night installed at the intersection,” Cressotti said. “There will be no work down on Notre Dame in the current phase.”
The drainage line going north from the intersection to Powdermill Broad, which frequently back flowed, flooding the intersection, has already been plugged to stop the back flow of brook water.
Cressotti said the improvement concept is to add dedicated left turn lanes to both the northbound and southbound traffic on North Elm Street, which is why the road is being widened along the western curb, creating additional pavement to accommodate the central dedicated turning lanes.
“The city has the desire to introduce that central turning lane,” Cressotti said earlier this year. “The current four lane configuration is not sufficient for the volume of traffic and the turning movements. So there will be two through lanes for northbound traffic and two through lanes for southbound traffic, in addition to the dedicated left turn lanes north (to upper Notre Dame Street) and south (to lower Notre Dame Street), meaning that the street will be widened to a total of five lanes at that intersection.”
