Harrisburg submitted paperwork today to expand the scope of repairs to a section of sidewalk along the Susquehanna River that was damaged three years ago by Tropical Storm Lee, the city engineer’s office said Monday.
The repairs, one of several projects for which the city was awarded federal and state aid, are focused on a section of the river walk near the Shipoke neighborhood downtown, between I-83 and the railroad bridge.
Originally, the city planned to repair select parts of this stretch of the walk in a patchwork fashion, said Wayne Martin, the city engineer. But after discovering that soil beneath part of the walk had eroded, the city expanded the scope of work to include filling in the missing dirt and replacing the stretch of sidewalk in its entirety.
Rogele, Inc., a Harrisburg-based construction company, will still complete the project at the price quoted in their original bid, Martin said.
In January 2012, city officials under the administration of former Mayor Linda Thompson applied for about $2 million in aid to help mitigate the damage caused by Lee, whose rains severely flooded the Susquehanna the previous September.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, ultimately approved 45 projects totaling $1,947,077, according to Ruth Miller, the deputy press secretary for the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, which assists local applicants in the process of seeking aid.
In addition to the repairs to the river walk, those projects included replacing stacked rock in 18 separate locations along the riverfront embankment, performing electrical work on Sunken Gardens in Riverfront Park and replacing a set of concrete steps and railings at Locust Street that were washed out in the flood, among others.
The aid money was awarded as a mixture of cash advances for small projects and pledges for reimbursement upon the completion of larger ones. So far, the city has received $878,754 of its awarded funding, representing $671,741 from FEMA and $207,013 from the commonwealth, according to figures Miller provided.
Martin said Monday that the river walk repair work would be paused while the city waited for FEMA to approve the project’s change in scope. Despite the delay, all of the approved repair projects are expected to be completed by the end of October, he said.
