Appleway reconstruction begins first phase in spring

Next spring, Spokane Valley will reconstruct a deteriorating portion of East Appleway Avenue at the eastern edge of the city. Following a funding shortfall, though, transportation officials have suggested that the city use money set aside for a project to extend Appleway east from the couplet to pay for the rest of the repairs.

Next year, crews will begin rebuilding Appleway between Tschirley and Barker roads, putting in a five-lane road with sidewalks and a new intersection.

“It definitely needs to be worked on, that’s for sure,” Mayor Diana Wilhite said after a presentation on the project at Tuesday’s council meeting.

Originally, the work also included the section of Appleway from Barker Road to the city limits. But the project’s cost, estimated by Spokane County in 2004 at about $2 million, has more than doubled to $4.5 million because of rising construction costs and studies that found the existing road was in much worse shape than originally thought.

The city decided to split it into two phases, with the section from Barker Road to the city limits now tentatively scheduled for spring 2008, said city spokeswoman Carolbelle Branch.

At Tuesday night’s meeting, Public Works Director Neil Kersten told the City Council that doing so would allow the city to apply for more grants to cover the second part of the project.

Officials at the Spokane Regional Transportation Council, which manages grant money for roads, said additional money was unavailable right now but suggested that the city use $460,000 already set aside for the other Appleway project since it will all eventually be a part of the same road.

Councilman Rich Munson asked if using the money would delay building the portion of Appleway where the couplet ends.

Kersten said it wouldn’t, and that the city would have to find additional money for that project in any case.

There is about $4 million set aside to extend Appleway to Evergreen, but cost estimates for the project in a staff report are now at about $14 million.

The City Council will decide how it wants to fund the second phase of the Appleway project at Barker at a future meeting. Branch said the next time the funding is likely to come up is during the council’s next discussion on the city’s six-year road plan in the spring.