After years of planning, the first phase of construction on the $44 million Vancouver Waterfront Access Project will start today.
It will be most noticeable to motorists who use the West Sixth/Seventh street connector between Grant and Jefferson Streets.
That stretch of street will be closed until Spring 2013, said Hassan Abdallah, city engineering project manager.
During the first construction phase, workers with Nutter Corp. will be reconstructing the main BNSF Railway line from Columbia Street to Jefferson Street, including bridge structures at Esther and Grant streets.
The work will mean additional closures, including Sixth and Fourth streets, this summer.
The second construction phase is slated to start next year, and will include extending Esther and Grant streets south under the rail line to the waterfront.
The road project is part of Vancouver’s deal with waterfront project developer Gramor Development of Tualatin, Ore. Investors expect to build mid-rise condominiums, offices, boutiques and restaurants worth an estimated $900 million on the 32-acre former industrial site.
Plans call for re-opening Grant Street, which lies along the east side of the The Columbian’s press offices at 701 W. Eighth St. and is currently closed to through traffic.
The city vacated the street in the 1950s.
Crews must lower the intersection at Sixth and Grant streets to create a new 16.5-foot clearance underneath two existing railroad bridges. Two crossings where trains must now blow their horns — at Eighth street and at Jefferson street — will go quiet as the project is completed.
Dropping the grade on Sixth Street will make the building at 615 W. Sixth St. — now leased by Petlock Inc. — inaccessible, so the city bought it.
The city paid Scott Campbell, publisher of The Columbian, $2.315 million for Grant Street and $2.065 million for the Petlock building.
