Council looks into sprucing up bridge, water tower

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

The Charles City Council heard about quotes obtained to paint the light poles on the Main Street Bridge and expand the lighting on the water tower at Wednesday’s planning meeting.

In a follow-up to an inquiry from the Main Street Charles City organization about addressing the appearance of the bridge prior to RAGBRAI spending a night in Charles City this summer, the city obtained quotes on prices to hand scrape, prime and repaint the railings on the Main Street Bridge and Mill Race Park.

Additionally, the quote will provide for painting the benches at Mill Race Park and the decorative lights on the bridge. Painting the bridge itself was deemed to be too expensive based on the pricing received just a couple years ago, so no quote for bridge painting was acquired.

Quotes were received from Johnson Painting of Charles City for $12,850, and from Iowa Wall Systems Inc. of Waterloo for $53,050, with both quotes agreeing to do the work before July 28 when RAGBRAI rolls into town.

If approved, Road Use Tax Funding that was dedicated to LED street light replacement in the downtown decorative lighting will be used to fund the project. LED street light replacement will be deferred to a future date.

As to the water tower lighting, in June of last year the city added two remote-controlled color-changing lights to the Corporate Drive water tower, which now illuminate the “Charles City” lettering. There has been discussion of adding two additional lights, 90 degrees off of the current two, so that the entire tower is lit up, including the new city logos.

The proposal is to move the two existing lights around to illuminate the city logo with one light each and that the additional four lights in this proposal be used to put two lights each on the lettering.

The controls that were initially purchased last year are able to control the additional lights, which would allow for a light show on special occasions such as Christmas and the 4th of July. Each light pole would operate on its own for a maximum of four different colors at once.

Quotes received from Musco Lighting for equipment were for $12,800 for two lights or $17,800 for four lights. Quotes from Perry Novak Electric for installation were $14,800 for two lights and the same price for four lights. The total cost would be $27,600 for two lights and $32,600 for four lights. The original project in 2021 was $45,500.

In other business on Wednesday, the council heard a request from LJP/Jendro Sanitation to allow an additional surcharge for fuel under the current waste hauling contract. The request is going out to all the communities the company serves because of recent increases in diesel prices.

Jendro is basing the requested amount on fuel pricing base price of $3.50 a gallon. Any additional amount on top of that would be prorated between communities based on hours of operation within the respective community.

The current reference price of $4.65 a gallon in March would result in an additional $577 for the first month. If diesel reaches $5 a gallon the additional cost would be $726 to the city.

City Administrator Steve Diers suggested that the council consider approval of this temporary surcharge to be paid to LJP/Jendro’s, but elect not to increase user rates until they see several months of this pricing. He said that additional costs for the next several months can be paid with existing cash balance of the fund.

Also on Wednesday, the council heard about the results of an Iowa Department of Transportation speed study on South Grand from the south corporate limits to Old Highway Road, which the City Council had previously requested.

That stretch of road has three separate speed limit zones. North of CUSB Bank the posted speed limit is 35 miles per hour. From CUSB Bank to Molstead Motors the speed limit is 45 miles per hour. South of Molstead Motors the speed limit is 55 miles per hour.

An analysis of traffic accidents showed that from Jan. 1, 2017, to Dec 31, 2021, there were 15 reported crashes. The calculated crash rate for this area was 210.5 crashes per hundred million vehicle miles, compared to a statewide average of 263 crashes per hundred million vehicle miles on a municipal US highway.

The study did not recommend decreasing the speed limit, but supports increasing the 45 miles per hour zone to 50 miles per hour. Maintaining the existing posted speed limits is also acceptable to the DOT.

In other business on Wednesday, the council:

— Discussed the possible implementation of a permit process for placement of trash and refuse dumpsters within the city’s right-of-way. This will provide specific information to dumpster providers on the requirements prior to placing a dumpster, and it will furnish the city information such as where dumpsters are placed, duration of placement, and contact information for the dumpster provider.

— Reviewed on overnight town agreement with RAGBRAI to temporarily rent, occupy and make use of the town for the purpose of hosting the RAGBRAI Expo, a multi-day bicycling ride involving music, food, beer and other entertainment, on Thursday, July 28.

— Further discussed a Right of Way agreement with Omnitel for installation of fiber optic cable in the city right of way so the company can begin offering high-speed internet to an initial customer base in Charles City.

— Discussed the acceptance of a water quality initiative grant for the Phase 2 of the Arboretum Project. The project will install a number of BMP’s (best management practices) for stormwater management in the area.

— Discussed the acceptance of the 2020 Sanitary Sewer Lining Project with Municipal Pipe Tool Co. The construction work has been finished since November of 2020. The project was completed for at a total cost of $397,466.61 which is more than the original bid amount of $304,057