The City of Jacksonville is going to have to relocate some utilities along Anna Street in the coming months.
Ameren Illinois is currently working a site along the Town Brook that formerly served as a coke gas plant for the city during the 19th Century and early part of the 20th Century. As a result of performing soil remediation, the project has hit a delay because of city water and sewer lines that are currently in the way.
Benton & Associates Engineer Jamie Hedden outlines what’s going to have to happen for the project to move forward on schedule: “In the middle of part of that project, there are some existing utilities. The city has an existing water main but also a large diameter sewer main that really runs right along the project area. Ameren is doing their best to be a good partner with the city and take care of those utilities that are in conflict and in part of the remediation zone. So far it looks favorable that Ameren is going to be taking care of about $881,000 worth of sewer main relocation. Staging and construction during that time, we won’t have any outages because they are going to be doing bypass pumping and other things they need to make sure services are not interrupted.”
Ameren is currently mixing in cement to lock chemicals into the soil and subsoil to keep them from leeching into groundwater and becoming toxic. Hedden says that Ameren plans to turn the area back into a green space once things are done.