City council gets Messer Street update

The Rhinelander city council received an update on the Messer Street project during a meeting April 14. 

Mark Barden of Town and Country Engineering, Inc. said “it seemed like this took forever, but the Messer Street project finally started.”

“We started with tree removals on April 3 and the contractor came in and started saw cutting last week,” he said. “The tree removals we did were all on Messer, Pearl, we started out with those and then we had a bunch of conversations with residents on Freemont and Evergreen and Lakeshore. There are more trees to come out, but we’re taking a lot of those on a case-by-case basis and having those conversations with those residents.”

Barden said Wisconsin Public Service (WPS) started to install a gas main “a couple weeks ago.” He said the company will be starting to “replace some gas services within the project.”

“Some aldermen may have received phone calls, emails, I know there’s some Facebook posts about the right-of-way stakes that were put out there and there was a lot of concern with those,” he said. “Those were not put out by us or our contractor, they were put out by WPS. Whenever WPS moves poles or puts anything underground, they have to stake the right-of-way so that they ensure that they are in the right-of-way.”

The stakes, Barden said, don’t “directly reflect how far back we’re going to be going within that right-of-way.”

He said he spoke to some residents who were concerned over what those stakes were placed for and “we straightened all that out.”

Barden said construction began “a couple weeks later than anticipated” due to poor weather.

“However, we’re still on pace to hit the June 13th date for finishing Rose and the July 3rd date for everything north of Rose,” he said. “So we’re still on schedule to get everything completed on time.”

Removal of asphalt, pavement, curb and gutter on Rose Street began the day of the April 14 meeting, according to Barden, and sanitary and sewer was starting to be installed at the intersection of Rose Street and Lakeshore Drive as well. 

Thayer Street was closed and limited to only local traffic, he said, with a detour arranged via Mason Street. 

Sanitary and sewer work was to begin on April 15 or April 16 at the intersection of Thayer Street and Rose Street, Barden said. 

“When they’re done in that intersection it will be gravel until we get everything done, but we can open Thayer back up at that time or we can keep just open to local traffic because it will be only a gravel patch in there,” he said. “

Barden addressed one last thing about the Messer Street project, which he indicated a lot of fake news about it circulated on social media. 

“We have talked to a lot of people,” he said. “I just want to reiterate this. There was a lot of talk on Facebook about the project. We have went out and talked to a lot of people about trees, private sewers, private driveways, everybody has been very easy to work with and very open with the project.”

City arborist Tom Jerow has spoken to people about trees involved in the project as well, Barden added. 

“So our experience with the residents out there has been a good one,” he said. “Everybody has been really easy to work with and presumably fairly happy with the project thus far.”

Trevor Greene may be reached via email at [email protected].