UPDATE: Culvert cost savings

LISA HOBBS – News Editor

According to Highway Road Superintendent Josh Roberts, replacing the culvert on Cooper Road using in-house labor has saved $200,000.

“This is the first box culvert, to my knowledge, that we have done here at the Highway Department all in-house,” he stated. “These are contracted out. The last project that was done was close to $300,000. I think it was $285,000 or $290,000.”

According to departmental records, the Cooper Road project will cost $57,759 at completion.

The information was shared during the county’s Highway and Bridge Committee meeting.

“The guys have done a phenomenal job. I’m very excited to say that. We started Monday [Oct. 12] at 6:30 in the morning with two track hoes and we started digging. We had a jackhammer out there as well to hammer out the old box. It was a poured-in-place box. In one day, we had it fully dug out.”

Roberts said the decision to conduct the work in-house was made out of necessity, a need to replace the culvert quickly.

“This was an emergency,” he stated. “The road had fallen in. We received a call from 911. We went out and looked at it. They went down into the hole and saw that the whole wall had given out. We saw daylight, which is never good. It was an old break, of course. There was no rebar attaching it. It was ready to give in at any moment.”

Bidding the project out would have taken weeks, as well as additional time for the winning bidder to start working on replacement.

“I’m very proud of the guys. I feel like this will be close to a $200,000 saving to the Highway Department on this one project by us doing it in-house. I’m just thankful that we had the equipment and the manpower to do it. I’m very thankful and proud.”

Roberts expressed his belief that Cooper Road will reopen on Tuesday, Oct. 20.

UPDATE: Due to unforeseen circumstances, this project will not be completed until the week of Oct. 26. According to Roberts, the department is dealing with “a lot of water” that slowed completion of the project. He said it will be open next week but could not provide an exact date.