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County Road Improvement plan focuses on small cities

Lead Summary
By
Mavis Fodness

Summer 2020 road improvements will focus on the small cities in Rock County, according to the six-year road and bridge construction plan adopted Feb. 18 by county commissioners.
Highway engineer Mark Sehr outlined the 2020 to 2025 projects in a 27-page Powerpoint presentation and will share it at a public meeting 1 p.m. Tuesday, March 17, at the Rock County Library.
For 2020, road construction will focus on the county highways within cities.
Three-inch mill and overlay work is scheduled on the county highways in Hardwick, Beaver Creek, Hills, Steen and Magnolia.
Broadway Street in Magnolia will undergo a full-depth reconstruction.
“The north-south street in front of the café will be a total reconstruct,” Sehr said. “That concrete is shot.”
One block of Magnolia’s Broadway Street will be narrowed with the addition of a grass boulevard between the road and the new sidewalk.
Construction on Main Street Luverne is limited to drainage and sidewalk repairs from Highway 75 to the Rock County bridge.
Sehr is currently meeting with Luverne officials on the scope of the project.
“We are not doing everything, but it will be a $50,000 project by the time we are done,” Sehr said.
A full depth reconstruction of Luverne’s Main Street is planned for 2022 along with a mill and overlay of County Road 4 from the Rock River bridge in Luverne through Magnolia to the Nobles County line.
Finishing out projects for 2020 is a three-inch mill and overlay on County Road 11 from Steen to the Iowa state line.
Also in 2020, Sehr plans to invest $500,000 in sealing road cracks with a mastic product on county roads 4, 6 and 7 through a private contractor.
“It (mastic) is a cement, rubber, hot sealant that levels as it fills the cracks,” Sehr said. “We (county crews) can do 10 to 12 miles a year but we are not keeping up.”
State-aid funds will pay for the private contractor.
A sixth-year was added to the normal five-year road construction plan and focuses on full-depth reconstruction of the county gravel roads.
Sehr said the 2025 construction plan focuses on strengthening the state-aid gravel roadbeds with a cement base and covered with four-inches of gravel on county roads 15, 11, 19 and 16.
In 2025, plans also call for the widening of the intersection at County Road 5 (Dodge Street in Luverne) and Highway 75.

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