By Gail Peckler-Dziki/Correspondent
The Paddock Lake Village Board accepted a bid from E&N Hughes Co., Inc., Monroe, for $83,673 for the Highway 50 manhole cover rehabilitation scheduled for this summer. The Hughes bid was the lowest of four.
June 16 is the tentative start date for a manhole cover rehabilitation program in Paddock Lake. The 39 manhole covers are located on the north side of the westbound lane in a tire lane. Village administrator Tim Popanda said the covers are showing severe signs of wear.
“The sewer system on that road was last modified in 1987,” Popanda explained. “We had expected the Highway 50 reconstruction to be done in 2016, but Wisconsin Department of Transportation (DOT) has moved that to 2020. We can’t wait that long to fix the manhole covers.”
Popanda said that traffic has so vibrated the manhole covers that some are settling and some are sinking.
“You can see components of some the manholes through the covers,” he said. “In a few of the manholes, some bricks have crumbled and some have fallen into the sewer system.”
The project is slated to begin after school ends and should take 30 days with an estimated end date of mid-July. Popanda said that times of lane closings would be posted prior to the project.
“If this were a few manhole covers on a village street,” Popanda said, “we would do this in house with staff. But 39 manhole covers on Highway 50 is a much larger project than our three public works and two sewer plant staff can manage. Because it is Highway 50 that has a large volume of traffic, more people are needed and traffic control is somewhat costly.”
The three other bids were Infrastructure Technologies, Inc., Rogers, Minn., for $83,965; Kim Construction C. Inc., Steger, Ill., for $108,675 and The Wanasek Corp., Burlington, for $109,999.