WILMINGTON — The bad news is the collapsing portions of Garden Avenue, where two sinkholes have concerned neighbors since before Hurricane Florence, has gone several months past its original schedule. The good news is six other major road repair issues around the city are being tackled.
Garden Avenue is a one-block street located in a quiet neighborhood between Oleander Drive and Wrightsville Avenue. According to neighbors, two cave-ins along the street have been growing worse since before Hurricane Florence exacerbated the situation last year. The holes have been filled with gravel, but are still sinking.
According to city spokesperson Malissa Talbert, the road situation is worse than initially thought so the city had to revise the scale of the project.
“This is one of the major repair projects identified following Hurricane Florence. The project was originally scheduled to be bid in May but additional damage was found and so the project had to be revised and is now in the process of being rebid. There is a large drainage pipe under the road that is causing the cave-ins and the pipe will be repaired/replaced,” Talbert wrote in an email.
Talbert noted the Garden Avenue was one of seven issues around the city that staff tackled after addressing more immediate post-hurricane repairs. The city will receive federal reimbursement for these projects, which means the process will take longer.
“The city had to get federal officials to inspect and approve the repair sites to make sure the city would be reimbursed for the work. Because the city has to pay for all of these repairs out-of-pocket with taxpayer dollars, we want to be sure to get reimbursed for as much of that as possible,” Talbert said.
The other projects have completed the bid process and are preparing to start or underway – and some are already completed – Talbert said.
The revised Garden Avenue project has not yet been put out to bid, and there is no current estimated timeline for project completion. When the bid is announced it will likely include a construction deadline (current and past project bids can be found here).
