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News
By Allison Joy
IRON RIVER — A full replacement of the Genesee Street Bridge is not financially feasible for Iron River, the city council determined last month at its Feb. 22 regular meeting.
The city was notified “a year or so ago,” that it would need to either replace or rehabilitate the bridge, according to City Manager Rachel Andreski.
“It has exceeded the life expectancy by many [more] years than what was initially thought,” Andreski told the council. “And then, we’ve discovered that it is a historic bridge, so we might be eligible to have some wiggle room that way.”
An assessment of the project by Wickwire in Iron River estimated a replacement would cost the city at least $885,550. Even that estimate hinges on the city receiving the maximum amount of grant funding eligible from the state — through a bridge program with projects booked three years out, according to Wickwire’s report. Replacing the bridge would also hinge on approval from the State Historical Preservation Office, which would likely require a more costly arch design in line with the current structure.
Wickwire estimated that preventative maintenance to the existing bridge would cost the city an estimated $95,250. This estimate also hinges on a maximum level of eligible funding from a state program booking projects three years out.
Preventative maintenance would include barrier patching, chipping and patching the concrete arch, epoxy injection in cracks, substructure patching, adding deck drain extensions and removing debris from the channel. This work would not allow the city to remove load posting from the bridge but would maintain it for 15-20 years, according to Wickwire.
“Is getting the preventative maintenance … going to inhibit us, lower our chances [to receive additional funding] if we do have to do a bridge replacement in the near future?” Council member Benjamin Garcia asked Seth Miatech from Wickwire in attendance at the February meeting.
Miatech answered that while he did not believe so, he was unsure and would look into the matter.
Ultimately, the council voted unanimously to move forward with pursuing grant funding and preventative maintenance on the bridge.
The council also discussed the following matters at its February meeting:
• Andreski said that Iron River received almost $150,000 in reimbursement from the state for blight elimination. Iron River Police Chief Curt Harrington said he addressed with Honorable Judge Donald Powell that officers were not being invited to court hearings regarding blight violations, and that moving forward IRPD would be notified so Harrington could sit in on the hearings.
“The judge also said that he understands it, he respects it, he thinks we’re doing a good job of cleaning this up and pushing this blight issue that we have in our city,” Harrington said.
• Harrington also shared that the IRPD had submitted a proposal to the West Iron County School District’s request for a new school resource officer, which would allow the department to hire an additional officer. He also said that the department was addressing a singular complaint regarding a smell coming from Contrast Coffee — that the roastery’s chimney and filtration system was up to code but the department was continuing to look into a possible ordinance violation.
• Iron County Board Commissioner Mike Stafford shared with the council that the health department board had awarded the former Iron County Health Department building to Jim Mylchreest and Jocelyn Javoroski. He said the couple would be moving their daycare center into the building and expanding operations, as well as potentially offering short-term lodging.
• City attorney Mark Tousignant said he had been spending a lot of time reviewing existing zoning ordinances and proposed new ones.
“If you wanted to build an apartment building in Iron River, you can’t,” Tousignant said. “There’s no place that is zoned that will allow you to do that. Every place that is now zoned multi-resident already has an apartment on it.”
He said the issue was a problem given the city’s desire to see more conditional use structures and single-family rental homes.
The Iron River City Council meets the third Wednesday of each month at 4:30 p.m. in City Hall. The next meeting will be held March 20. More information is available at ironriver.org/city-council.
Wendy Graham contributed to the reporting of this article.