Harrisburg roadwork. File photo.
According to City Engineer Joel Seiders, it’s a busy time for Harrisburg infrastructure work. The city is starting summer paving, designing safety improvement projects and revisiting stalled multimodal projects proposed years ago.
In the midst of the work, Harrisburg is also evaluating infrastructure needs through a three-year city-wide traffic study, Seiders said. The first year, which is happening now, will examine infrastructure in Allison Hill, year two will study downtown, and year three will look at Midtown and Uptown. Seiders will be evaluating traffic flow and volume, safety and other needs.
“We will always target the areas that are the most unsafe,” Seiders said. “This is one of the topics that the administration and I are in complete agreement on—safety.”
But while they execute that comprehensive study, there’s already lots in the works. Seiders talked with TheBurg about all that’s planned.
Current/Beginning Projects
The city is getting close to starting three road paving projects.
N. 15th Street, from Arsenal Boulevard to Herr Street, will be paved, likely starting by early June. Work includes constructing speed cushions—which differ from speed humps in that they allow emergency vehicles to straddle them—and constructing ADA curb ramps.
Seneca Street, N. Front to N. 7th Street, will also be paved and curb ramps will be added. That project is in the early construction phase.
Lastly, a road paving and ADA upgrade project on N. 18th Street, from Brookwood to Market Street, is currently out to bid.
Starting at the end of the month, Seiders said that the city will repair the bridge on Market Street that goes over Paxton Creek, near S. Cameron Street. Seiders explained that part of the bridge’s wall is deteriorating, which has negatively impacted the sidewalk. The repair will keep the bridge stable until the city can fully replace the bridge, slated for sometime after 2030.
Coming Soon
In the near future, the city will also work on re-striping streets in “high visibility areas,” Seiders said. He said that Harrisburg recently re-painted lines at N. 5th and Market Streets, with positive results and feedback.
Harrisburg projects that by the end of the year, it will have replaced temporary speed humps on N. 3rd, Division and Berryhill Streets with permanent speed cushions. The city has recently come under scrutiny from PennDOT for the current temporary speed humps, which it has said are not to code. Seiders said that contracts for the permanent structures will go out to bid as soon as possible to be in compliance by the end of the year.
“Those were locations identified by the administration as high incident areas,” Seiders said.
In the next year or two, Harrisburg will also use state grant money to retime traffic lights and pedestrian signals—25 downtown and 13 in Allison Hill.
Revisiting Stalled Projects
Several bigger road improvement projects that stalled for years are either in the design or fundraising phase and slated for construction in the coming years.
First up, a Herr Street pedestrian safety project, from 15th Street to Arsenal Boulevard, is in final design, with construction slated to start next year. In conjunction with PennDOT, Harrisburg will improve sidewalks and curb ramps and add protected bike lanes.
Scheduled to begin construction late next year, the city will continue a project that was proposed in 2020. The East-West Multimodal Connection Project included added safety improvements and bike lanes on Walnut Street, from N. Front to N. 4th Street, and on Chestnut Street, from 3rd to 4th Streets. The Chestnut Street portion has been completed.
The city recently was awarded $1 million in state Transportation Alternatives Set-Aside (TASA) funds for Walnut Street. The road will be repaved, bike lanes will be created, raised intersections will be built at N. 2nd and Walnut Streets, and, from 2nd to 3rd Street, the current three traffic lanes will be reduced to two to make room for a bike lane.
Another lingering project proposed years ago, the “Courthouse Connection Multimodal Project,” will finally move forward. The project includes taking the Boyd Street “Urban Meadow,” a pedestrian walkway that currently runs from N. 3rd to Fulton Street, and extending it to N. 6th Street, near where the federal courthouse is.
While Seiders said the project has been a “lower priority” for the administration, which is why it has yet to be completed, the city doesn’t want to “leave that money on the table.” Harrisburg received a $700,000 state grant in 2021, which has been extended to June 2027.
Years in the Making
Looking further down the road, Harrisburg has plans to re-work Division Street, from N. 2nd to N. 7th Street, by slowing traffic and improving pedestrian features. The city has not yet entered the design phase, but is still securing funding and applying for grants.
Recent grant applications would also support future city plans for construction on N. 6th, Market and 17th streets, roads identified as in need of safety upgrades, but that don’t yet have solid plans, Seiders said.
Harrisburg is also involved in two PennDOT bridge replacement projects. Construction is slated to begin on the Market Street Bridge next year. That project includes rehabbing the old bridge and constructing a separate utility bridge on the south side of the bridge that would also accommodate pedestrian and bike traffic. At a public meeting last summer, city officials showed PennDOT’s plans to eliminate a traffic lane, but since then, Seiders said that PennDOT has gone back to the original plan of maintaining the current four lanes.
The deteriorating Maclay Street Bridge is also set for replacement by PennDOT. While construction was originally slated to begin in 2024, PennDOT’s website now estimates starting this year.
It’s a busy next couple of years for Harrisburg–work that Seiders sees as necessary to keep city residents and visitors safe.
Harrisburg’s priorities are still informed by Vision Zero, an initiative that aims to eliminate all pedestrian fatalities, he said.
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