International Paper gas line on track for June completion

♦ Crews continue night work on main thoroughfares but residential construction will take place during the day.

Motorists on Shorter Avenue can expect to be navigating around the International Paper gas line construction for the next few months, with crews setting up work sites in other parts of the city as well.

Rome Engineering Director Aaron Carroll said that, as of Friday, the Ridge Ferry Park and Riverside Parkway portions of the project are about 45% done and 1,125 feet of the Atlanta Gas Light-managed pipeline has been installed.

Some locals have voiced their frustration as the construction continues. Steel plates take up a large portion of Shorter Avenue and the intersection of Burnett Ferry Road was reduced to two lanes, snarling traffic early Tuesday.

And residents who use Martha Berry Boulevard to get to and from work might’ve noticed the new steel plates stretching from the CVS Pharmacy to the Exxon gas station at the corner of Oakwood Street.

Carroll said some of those will probably be removed this week, as crews begin to install some of the pipe on that road.

None of the work has started yet on Charlton Street, one of the main roads in the historic Summerville Park neighborhood. Carroll said that schedule is “fluid” as they prepare to work with the residents on how they will be able to get in and out of their driveways.

Carroll said there will be no night construction on the residential streets, with the normal work hours ranging from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

“We have those residents’ best interest in mind and we will be working with those residents,” he said. “But everyone who lives on or regularly uses that road will be impacted.”

Soon, the construction will move toward Redmond Road as they work to eventually tie into an existing pipeline that sits on the corner of Coosawattee and Shorter avenues.

At that point more excavations will lead to more steel plates on Redmond.

Construction workers are currently boring into the river at Burwell Creek, but they should be finished soon, Carroll said. The trailhead will reopen on March 1.

In all, the 9.3-mile pipeline is projected to be finished by June and will eventually run all the way down Alabama Highway to the paper mill.

Olivia Morley Construction workers begin to dig ditches in front of the Hardy Realty building on Martha Berry Boulevard on Monday night.

Olivia Morley Crews unload an excavator at the Martha Berry Boulevard construction site for pipeline.