OKLAHOMA CITY – A narrow rural bridge in Stephens County will be replaced, and more than a mile and a half of sidewalks in Duncan are scheduled for replacement following votes by the state’s Transportation Commission.
Contracts totaling nearly $1.7 million on both projects were awarded recently by the commission.
The bridge lies on the north/south County Road 2836 and spans a tributary of Cow Creek 2.1 miles north of the SH-53 junction near Comanche.
The steel-beam bridge is 35 feet long, 20 feet wide, and has a reduced load-bearing limit.
It will be replaced with a steel-reinforced concrete bridge that’s 861⁄2 feet long with a 26-foot-wide roadway, blueprints show.
A $585,857 contract on the project was awarded to Sewell Brothers of Oklahoma City.
According to department officials, the bridge carried an average of 50 vehicles per day in 2019.
In Duncan, pedestrian improvements are planned on various city streets: from Clayton Avenue extending north on Chisholm Trail Parkway, east on Elk Avenue, then south on Whisenant Drive, ODOT reported.
The 1.7-mile project has been described as “trail construction.”
“A trail is meant to have uses other than just pedestrian use,” said Jackson Mayberry of ODOT’S Media and Public Relations Division. “This includes biking, skating, scooters, etc.”
The definition of a trail is: “A route that is designed, designated, or constructed for recreational pedestrian use or provided as a pedestrian alternative to vehicular routes within a transportation system.”
A typical sidewalk is constructed at 5 feet in width, Mayberry said, “but this has areas 8 to 10 feet wide, which are setup to accommodate more than just pedestrians.”
Schiralli Construction Corp. of Wilson won the $1.1 million contract for the project.