By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
With the travel to and from the Barton County Landfill, Barton Community College, and traffic to the northeastern corner of the county, Northeast 30 Road is well traveled. Last resurfaced in 2010, the blacktop is due for another coat. County Engineer Barry McManaman asked the Barton County Commission for approval of the work during Tuesday's meeting.
"We advertised the project on our online vendor registry and we also put it in the Great Bend Tribune and we received one bid," he said. "That was from Venture Corporation in Great Bend. Their bid was in the amount of $795,004.70."
The county applied for funds from the Kansas Department of Transportation's Cost Share Program three times for the work but the funds went elsewhere. McManaman said the time has come to get the work done.
"We've been very fortunate with Cost Share," he said. "We've had a couple of other projects. We had the Airport Road and the Redwing intersection project, so we've been fortunate. It's highly competitive and we were really hoping we could get that funding and get at least part of the project paid for but that didn't work out."
The project includes a 1.5-inch hot mix overlay using an estimated 5,266 tons of material. The work will occur from the US-281 Highway intersection to Northeast 30 Avenue one-half mile east of the college. McManaman said the work should not take long, but it should not interfere with the BCC schedule. Venture anticipates completing the work sometime in July.