The Binkley Street Improvements Project has earned the City of Soldotna the 2014 Outstanding Innovative Design Award.
Project Manager Lee Frey said the Alaska chapter of the American Public Works Association recognized it as one of three APWA award winners at an awards ceremony Saturday, January 31 at the Petroleum Club in Anchorage.
Frey: “Some members of the organization had been down here and were aware of the project, a couple of them work for D.O.T. and other organizations. They had driven through the project and had some comments on things like pedestrian improvement, the wider sidewalks, the area’s where we put in separated sidewalks and of course the roundabouts, things like that. They thought the project as a whole was an interesting project.”
The rehabilitation included upgrades to Binkley Street’s asphalt, curbs, sidewalks, gutters and the adjusting and repairing of underground utilities for the first time in 30 years.
Frey has only been with the city for two years and oversaw the renovations as project manager.
Frey: “I’m pretty excited about it, we were proud of the way the project went this way this summer, we did the best we could to get the word out to the public on all the road closers we had which I would say was the biggest hurtle with the project. We had a lot of headaches to get through trying to keep the city functional, we were pretty happy with the way everything went. We had a lot of public outreach trying to get word out about the roundabouts and how to use them, how to drive through them and get the public educated on them, it’s been a learning process for sure but we’re happy with how everything is going.”
A couple of the other projects awarded last Saturday were Outstanding Community Project to the Anchorage School District for their Community Wide Sports Fields and Outstanding Large Project to the University of Alaska, Anchorage for the Alaska Airlines Arena.
