Council OKs items to move Parkway Boulevard overpass closer to fruition

The Dixon City Council unanimously approved a series of items related to the Parkway Boulevard overpass at its Tuesday meeting as the city attempts to get the project moving again.

These items included amending the original contract with T.Y. Lin International, updating the city’s Streets Master Plan, executing a reimbursement agreement with Union Pacific Railroad (UPRR), and creating a corresponding budget amendment with no net fiscal impact.

Since at least 1993, the city has had plans to

connect Parkway Boulevard to Pitt School Road to further develop the area and mitigate traffic impacts downtown. This item was included in Dixon’s General Plan that year, and in 2004, the city entered into an agreement with San Francisco-based infrastructure services firm T.Y. Lin. The project aims to extend Parkway Boulevard from its current endpoint at Valley Glen Drive and connect to Pitt School by creating an overpass to go above the railroad tracks in an attempt to create improved access to Dixon High School and easier travel for emergency vehicles.

Deborah Barr, senior civil engineer, said the plans, specification and estimate (PSE) were completed in 2016, but due to a lack of funding, the project was put on hold in 2017. Additionally, she said the UPRR guidelines that were in place when the PSE was approved have since changed. The new guidelines require the city to go back to the original PSE and revise them.

At this point, Barr said that staff has been directed to begin looking at the design and construction of the western embankment of the project. With the changing guidelines, Barr said the city amend its agreement with T.Y. Lin to the tune of $376,824.71.

“What that entails, in brief description of what they would be needing to do, is go back to our bridge type selection and get our PSE to 30 percent as well as doing the 100 percent for the western embankment,” she said.

Barr said the PSE includes additional earthwork, environmental documentation updates and revisions to the drainage and underground utilities in order to get the western embankment to the 100 percent plans.

Originally, Barr said the project was designed with a cast-in-place bridge in mind. With the updated UPRR guidelines, she said staff will need to return with precast girders as part of the plan.

“We have so much rail traffic that goes into town that UPRR has found that they are not able to delay trains long enough to allow cast-in-place girders to be built,” she said. “Therefore, bridges need to be built with precast girders. Therefore, we have to go back to our plans and revise them accordingly.”

Additionally, Barr said UPRR was planning to widen its rail in Dixon, which would present additional challenges to the cast-in-place design. Such designs have led to approximately 15 planned bridges in California that have been unable to get constructed because their initial designs called for castin-place girders and thus have been unable to reach their deadlines or funding agreements.

“We’re happy to go back to design now, in hopes that in our projection — if this takes five years, 10 years, 15 years — we’ve already done the due diligence to meeting the UPRR guidelines and their projected future,” she said.

For the second item, Barr said the city has a new proposed $60,000 agreement with UPRR “to get them on board,” do a diagnostic meeting and remain a part of the projects moving forward. So far, she said the city has conducted a Rail Corridor Study with transportation and planning firm DKS Associates, which is also currently overseeing Dixon’s Streets Master Plan and traffic impact fees.

“In conjunction, and to have a cost savings, we have been able to work with DKS before they’ve been able to complete the rail study, is to work with UPRR and look at this new design and take all of this into consideration,” she said.

Barr said the city and UPRR are planning to meet with Solano Transportation Authority to discuss all crossings in town and look at additional funding opportunities. Normally, she said UPRR would charge $30,000 per crossing to do a diagnostic study, but the agency is willing to do it for twice that amount to examine all crossings. This would bring UPRR out to meet with DKS to address any other guidelines the city should be concerned with at other crossings.

The final item was to amend the city’s contract with DKS to not exceed $34,905. With the firm already collecting data for the Streets Master Plan, Barr said Parkway could brought into consideration and move the project forward, utilizing the data for T.Y. Lin’s environmental updates.

“Everything is kind of a domino effect,” she said,

“and it’s all intermingled and needed to keep the project going to fruition.”

These revisions and updates, Barr said, would put the project on a path to a “state of readiness” once all plans are in place, which could result in future funding opportunities. The specifications for the western embankment would bring the overall package to a 30 percent PSE. However, she said staff would need to go back to bring it to 100 percent, but the city needs to complete the initial items before determining what it would take to get the PSE to 100 percent.

“Once we are at 100 percent, that’s when we are at a state of readiness,” she said. “Our game plan is hopefully in the next year or two that we can get ourselves there to finish getting this project to fruition and finding various funding available out there.”

The council voted 5-0 to approve all the items.

In other business, the council unanimously voted to appoint Kristin Janisch as the city’s interim city clerk until the Nov. 2 special election.