BROOKINGS — Are you dreading this year’s road construction season in Brookings? Well, you can turn that frown upside down, friend, because it’s going to be relatively quiet, according to Public Works Director John Thompson.

“No, not at all,” Thompson told the Brookings Register when asked about how intrusive the work would be. “It should be nothing like when I first got here two years ago when we had 22^nd Avenue (South).”

That doesn’t mean drivers, pedestrians and neighborhoods are in the clear, though: Thursday night’s public open house on construction projects spelled out what’s coming, and some of that includes mill-and-overlay work, road reconstruction, shared-used paths and intersection improvements. Specifics include:

Overlay/reconstruction projects

Thompson pointed out that this year’s mill and overlay projects will affect several roadways — with the biggest one involving 17^th Avenue South between Eighth Street South and 20^th Street South.

“There will be some traffic impacts there … there will be times some driveways will be blocked off, but there traffic will still be able to drive through there,” he said.

Meanwhile, full reconstruction is being planned for a pair of roadway segments: Third Avenue between 11^th Street and Harvey Dunn and Seventh Avenue between Fifth Street South and Eighth Street South. The latter goes by Medary Elementary School.

Completion dates vary by project — the full list of everything the city is doing can be found at https://brookingscommunityconstruction.info/ — but all segments are planned to wrap up no later than November.

Slurry sealing

This is probably the most extensive of the city’s endeavors this year, following a successful pilot project last year involving a portion of 22^nd Avenue South.

Thompson said this year’s project will basically do all of downtown, Medary Avenue from Second Street South to 20^th Street South, Orchard Drive from Medary Avenue east to 22^nd Avenue South, Eighth Street South from Main Avenue South east to 22^nd Avenue South along with other areas in the city.

Regarding downtown traffic concerns, he said the goal is to have it done at night “so it’s very little traffic impacts.” That said, the overall traffic disruption brought about by this type of work generally doesn’t amount to more than two to three hours. There are also other benefits that make the slurry sealing method much more attractive than chip sealing, Thompson said.

“We don’t have to follow back up with sweeping the rocks off or anything like that, so it’s better for motorists, it’s better for motorcyclists — you don’t have to worry about the (stray) rocks,” he said.

The latest the work is expected to go is November.

Shared use paths

Thompson said there are two such projects planned, and each will be 8 feet wide.

The first one is on 20^th Street South from Main Avenue South east to the soccer fields past Medary Avenue South. This is expected to wrap up no later than Nov. 1.

The second one will be on 12^th Street South from 17^th Avenue South east to 22^nd Avenue South. There will be traffic-slowing techniques employed in the vicinity of the Boys & Girls Club, including a degree of road narrowing, Thompson said. The window for the project is between June 2 and Aug. 15.

Intersection work

Two intersections will be focused on this year — the 12^th Street South and Main Avenue South intersection and the intersection of 20^th Street South and 22^nd Avenue South.

The scope of this year’s efforts on the former includes replacing the existing sidewalk ramps with ADA-compliant ramps, along with replacing the intersection’s traffic signals.

In the next few years, the intersection will be rebuilt. That work will, among other things, eliminate the “rutting” found on Main Avenue South in the vicinity of the intersection.

The latter project involves the eastern side of the intersection, widening the radius so trucks have an easier time of turning. It’ll begin in August and wrap up in November.

“This is just an additional improvement to that intersection, which is already a fairly new intersection,” Thompson said.

The story of why the work is being done now — rather than when the intersection of 20^th Street South and 22^nd Avenue South was first improved during the construction of Exit 130 on Interstate 29 in 2022-23 — involves red tape, a compressed timeline, land-use designations and the potential loss of millions in grant dollars if they weren’t used in a timely manner.

Since the new interchange project came in under budget, the city has opted to use the leftover funds for the new work on the intersection.

BMU watermain

This is the fifth phase of a years-long project, and this portion focuses on installing 16-inch raw and treated water mains from the U.S. Highway 14 Bypass to the city’s north wellfield. It will connect the wellfield with the new water treatment plant on 34^th Avenue.

Its estimated completion date is in October.

So, there you have it. This year’s construction season in a nutshell, with the full scope available at https://brookingscommunityconstruction.info/. It’s certainly not as aggressive as in recent years — but don’t get used to, folks.

“In a couple of years, I can’t say that the impact is always going to be this minimal to traffic,” Thompson pointed out. “We still do have to do 22^nd Avenue South from Eighth (Street South) down to 20^th (Street South), and then north on 22^nd north of Sixth (Street).”

— Contact Mondell Keck at mkeck@brookingsregister.com.