URBANA — A long-awaited reconstruction project for Florida Avenue in Urbana stands to be expanded, with much of the new higher cost potentially covered by a federal grant.
At Monday’s committee-of-the-whole meeting, the city council will be asked to sign off on a change in the city’s 2021 capital improvement plan to reflect a cost update for the Florida Avenue project — from the original $4.5 million to $12.03 million — due to an expanded scope of the project and higher construction costs.
Originally planned for the section of Florida between Vine Street and Lincoln Avenue, the new version would extend from Vine to the city line near Illinois Field.
It would include a new shared-use path on the south side of Florida for bicyclists and pedestrians from Lincoln to Race, new signalized intersections at Race and Vine streets and improved signalized intersections at Lincoln Avenue and Orchard Street.
The reconstruction of Florida Avenue has been in the city’s capital improvement plan since 2017, in part because of the condition of the pavement, the high-priority need for a shared-use path and level of daily traffic.
“The street’s in horrible condition,” Mayor Diane Marlin said.
The city is hoping to cover the additional cost with a grant from the federal government’s Rebuilding America’s Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity program announced earlier this year. The program is making $1.5 billion in funding available to help communities pay for projects with significant local or regional impact.
The deadline to apply is April 14, and grant recipients will be announced by Aug. 12.
The city is teaming up with the Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District and Champaign County Regional Planning Commission to apply.
MTD Managing Director Karl Gnadt said improvement of Florida Avenue is important to his agency because the road serves as a connection between Urbana and the University of Illinois campus and connection for bus riders at Orchard Downs.
Knadt said funding for major projects such as this is difficult to come by, and the grant application is providing an opportunity for the city and the MTD to collaborate on a potential new federal revenue source to address an issue that affects the wider community.
Also included in the expanded project are cutouts to allow MTD buses to pick up and drop off passengers without obstructing traffic, Gnadt said.
If the grant for the Florida Avenue project is approved, the city could potentially net nearly $11.5 million in federal funding to pay for construction and engineering costs, according to a memo to the council from city Public Works Director Tim Cowan and Management Analyst Will Kolschowski.
Cowan said the time frame for this project, even with the grant money, would remain about the same as it is now, with engineering work starting next year, construction beginning in 2024 and completion in 2025.
