January 20, 2025 • 11 mins
Excitement is building for Walker’s Fruit Ridge Bridge project set for 2025, a crucial endeavor designed to relieve traffic congestion and enhance connectivity within the community. Through detailed insights from city engineer Scott Conners, the episode explores upcoming construction phases, detours, and the integration of pedestrian-friendly features, ensuring that residents remain informed and engaged throughout the process.
• Overview of the engineering department's role in community projects
• Recap of 2024's significant infrastructure developments
• Introduction to the Fruit Ridge Bridge and its community importance
• Planned traffic management improvements for better flow
• Integration of sidewalks and trails into the project
• Secured grant funding and its role in project success
• Expected timeline for construction phases and detours
• Communication strategies to keep residents informed
• Brief discussion on the library renovation project
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome to Made in Walker, a podcast that connects
you to the people, the storiesand the ideas shaping our
community, from local innovatorsto everyday changemakers.
We're diving deep into whatmakes Walker a great place to
live, work and grow.
Here's your host, nicoleDiDonato.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Thank you for joining us for the Made in Walker
podcast.
I'm Nicole DiDonato, thecommunications manager for the
city of Walker, and today I'mjoined by our city engineer,
scott Connors, the man of thehour.
We've got some pretty bigprojects a big project that is
definitely coming up in 2025here.
But, scott, thank you so muchfor being here and tell us, kind
(00:48):
of high level, a little bitwhat the engineering department
does for the city of Walker.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
First, Well, we oversee the road system and a
lot of the private developments.
There's always a lot going on.
What we try to do is workbehind the scenes as much as we
possibly can.
We kind of summarize our dutieswith a three P's approach,
which is the public projects,the private projects that come
in from developers, and then thevarious programs that we have
to enact that are really behindthe scenes.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Okay, a lot to keep you guys busy.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Oh, for sure.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, 2024 was a pretty busy year.
Had a lot of infrastructure, alot of road reconstruction, but
that was all really to bring usto here and the big project of
2025, one of them, the FruitRidge Bridge.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Yeah, and 24 was the biggest year we've ever had by
far, and we did a lot ofdifferent work with Kinney
Avenue, with Bristol Avenue andthe Railroad Bridge, with Center
Drive and then finally withWalker Avenue to get that ready
for the Fruit Ridge Bridge thisyear.
So we added a traffic signal upat Form Island Walker.
That was a joint projectbetween Kent County Road
(01:50):
Commission, the City of Walkerand MDOT, believe it or not, and
that was completed at the verytail of the year to get us ready
so that this coming year, whenFruit Ridge is under
construction, Walker Avenue willbe ready, Kinney will be ready,
Bristol will be ready and we'llkind of take a lot of our
construction activity off theroads to let the city breathe a
little bit.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Yeah, that'll be nice , but until then, you know it
can be some growing pains here.
Let us know exactly what we'rekind of in for with the Fruit
Ridge Bridge.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, yeah, I think within a couple months no later
than March 31st we're going tosee that the bridge over the
highway is going to come downand that's going to be a pivotal
day because there's a lot oftraffic north and south across
that bridge, a lot of veryimportant traffic from the
industrial businesses and thenmostly from Kennewa Hills High
School, where they have a lot ofbuses and parents and students
(02:39):
coming across with facilities onboth sides of the road.
So that's really how it's goingto start is with that kind of
pain.
We're trying to remindeverybody that the pain is going
to be worth it and at the endwe're going to have a great
project for them when it opensback up.
We're going to end up withhighway interchange ramps that
are going to be lined up.
Finally, the westbound rampsare offset slightly by the AGO
(03:03):
gas station and that causes someproblems with all the Amazon
trips that come through thereand all the traffic in the gas
station, and we think that'sgoing to make that a whole lot
better along the whole corridor.
And then to the south on theeastbound highway.
The eastbound off-ramp gets offat Three Mile Road and that is
very difficult because a lot oflarge trucks are getting off to
(03:24):
go to different businesses onThree Mile and Fruit Ridge to
the north, and it's verydifficult to pull out of there
when it's busy.
Oftentimes you'll see somebodysit there for 20 minutes or so
and then take a risk to pull out, and so what we're going to do
is realign that with theeastbound off-ramp.
That'll be on Fruit Ridge andit'll be signalized, and so that
movement will get a whole loteasier.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
And you know, in addition to the truck traffic,
the motor traffic, there's goingto be also some sidewalks and
trails as well.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, and that's a really exciting part about this
is that we're going to have somesidewalk on the east side of
the road across the bridge.
We're going to make all theconnections that are needed on
the east side of the road, butthen on the west side we're
going to have an actual regionaltrail and it's really a great
link for all the different trailsystems in the area.
It's going to connect theMuscatawa and the Pioneer Trail
and the White Pine Trail,essentially to the north, with
(04:14):
the Standale Trails and KentTrails to the south, and we've
been waiting for a very longtime to have this connection so
that people from out of town cancome through and pretty much
get to wherever they want.
We'll be kind of a little bitof a hub.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yes, yes, it's kind of like that missing link, the
last little section there inorder to finish that trail
system.
Very excited for this.
It's been a long time coming aswell.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
Yeah, we're excited.
We did get a grant for about $2million to help out with that.
The budget was getting prettytight on this project and that
$2 million grant is going tomake a huge difference to allow
us to build that trail tocompletion.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Yes, and as far as, like the project itself, it's
going to be MDOT taking most ofthe work and then the city of
Walker will be kind of doingsome support work.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, the financing was a little strange because the
$25 million that's really theseed for the project came to the
city of Walker through a stateappropriation.
So we had a little bit.
We had a pretty good hand inthe card game there in how this
comes out.
But we realized early on thatit's way better to have MDOT
actually be the designer,because most of the work is in
their right-of-way and with thehighway there is some work
(05:16):
that's city work and that isadding a center turn lane on
Fruit Ridge to the north to helpout those businesses with
people getting in and out andthen the trail itself obviously.
So we do have a role in theproject.
We're going to try to focus ourresources more on those areas,
but we're also going to help outa lot with communications and
problem solving related to theoverall project, because having
(05:37):
that bridge out of service is abig deal to all of our residents
and business owners.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, that's right.
What kind of a timeline are welooking at here?
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Well, it's going to start in March, maybe as late as
March 31st.
There may be an opportunity forthat to start early, but not as
early as we thought originally,which is around February 1st.
So we'll have a little bit of areprieve here.
But the project is going to bepretty hot and heavy throughout
the summer, with a lot ofchanges.
There's many different phasesto it, with access being
adjusted here and there, but itsure should be done by middle to
(06:10):
the end of November.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Okay, so it's going to be a little bit of a tough
summer for all of us, but we'reall in the same boat here.
That's right.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
It's going to be a real test and I think, even the
people that are working on theproject.
We're very fortunate.
Our engineers from MDOT live inthe area no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Very much, you know.
Yeah, short-term pain,long-term gain.
Sometimes the mayor likes tosay so.
Talk about detours, how we'regoing to be kind of getting
ourselves around, right so thedetour is going to be Walker
Avenue.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
I think that's the simplest way to say it.
But for some of the businesses,like if you have a business on
Fruit Ridge Road, it's going tobe a long detour because you
won't be able to go across thebridge.
If you want to go south, you'llhave to go north, the four-mile
road, or you can use NorthRidge and then east on four-mile
to Walker Avenue and then southto the Walker Interchange.
Vice versa, I guess you coulduse three-mile road to the south
(07:07):
if you're stuck on the southend of Fruit Ridge and you want
to get to the north end, butit's going to be a long detour.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Yeah, yeah it will be .
And for the schools, as youwere mentioning, kenoa Hills has
schools north and south of thatbridge there.
What is that looking like forthem?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Well, it's especially important for them because
their bus garage is on the southside as well.
So the high school and themiddle school are on the north.
You've got some elementaryschools to the south.
They're going to go through alittle bit of pain as they try
to cycle those buses back andforth, but we've reached out to
them, we've worked with them.
In fact, earlier today I saw anemail from the superintendent
asking for an update and thecommunication's been great.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
That's huge and that's what we kind of want to
get out to residents andbusinesses as much as possible.
We will be communicatingchanges and whatnot.
And how will that communicationlook like?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Well, I think a lot of it might be coming through
your office, through socialmedia updates, and from our
office we may have some directmailings.
I also suspect that this willbe kind of a heavy news story.
We'll probably be doinginterviews from time to time.
We're going to use everythingthat we have available to us to
get the word out.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Yeah, All right, and you know we appreciate that.
Again, we knew this was comingfor a while.
2025 is the year, but it'sgoing to be so much better once
it's all done.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
It'll be a great project.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Yes, and if people do have kind of questions and a
good way to reach out, who aregoing to be the point?
Speaker 3 (08:24):
people Well, I'll be the point person from the city,
MDOT will also have a pointperson, and they have a local
communications manager that cantalk to the specifics of the
project.
But I guess the beauty of thisis that we're working as a team
and so we'll have manyopportunities and resources to
help people out.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
And how does it feel for you?
You know leading a lot of theseprojects coming off a year like
2024, so much on your plate.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
What did that look like?
Kind of looking back, I'm verytired.
Yeah, that was a really roughyear last year, I think with all
the work we had it was way morethan we've ever done at least
twice as much as we've ever donebut it was important.
We had to get all that stuffdone.
We had to divide and conquer alittle bit and we feel fortunate
that it was kind of a miraclethat we got all of that stuff
done.
This coming year is going to bea different kind of year
because we're not going to bemanaging active construction
projects on our local roadnetwork like this, but we'll
(09:13):
have some other projects as well, with some water, main and
sidewalks and things to occupythe construction side of us of
the city of Walker.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
All right, well, we really appreciate it, scott.
Of course that's not the onlybig project you have.
We will be talking about theWalker Library on some other
podcasts, but of course a lot ofthe word has already been out
through the news and such.
Maybe just briefly a little bitabout what folks can expect for
that.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
The library is a great project.
It's at the center of ourcampus where the existing
library is.
We're going to be renovatingthe existing building and adding
a two-story building adjacentto it.
It's a great project.
The design has been wonderful.
We're going to create somethingthat we're calling a beacon,
that is going to speak toRemembrance Road and it's going
to pull people in.
(09:55):
And we're even working on someadjustments to the existing
campus to make the existingcampus fit with the new design,
which is very exciting.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
That's a lot on your plate, but I know you're up for
the challenge though, right.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I think so.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
All right.
Well, we appreciate that somuch.
Scott.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
You're welcome.
Of course, we're going to havea lot of information about the
Fruit Ridge Bridge coming out.
As Scott was mentioning, a lotof it will be on social media.
Doing our best, we have monthlyelectronic newsletters.
If you're not even subscribedto that, that's something that
you can take advantage ofFacebook, twitter, instagram,
linkedin, you name it.
We're going to get thatinformation out to you.
(10:29):
Thank you so much, scott.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
And we appreciate you joining us for the Maiden
Walker podcast.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Made
in Walker podcast.
If you have comments orquestions about this podcast, or
if you have suggestions forfuture episodes, we'd love to
hear from you.
Please drop us an email atpodcast at walkercity.
Made in Walker is the officialpodcast of the city of Walker,
Michigan.
You can find Made in Walkerwherever you get your podcasts.
Welcome to Made in Walker, a podcast that connects
you to the people, the storiesand the ideas shaping our
community, from local innovatorsto everyday changemakers.
We're diving deep into whatmakes Walker a great place to
live, work and grow.
Here's your host, nicoleDiDonato.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Thank you for joining us for the Made in Walker
podcast.
I'm Nicole DiDonato, thecommunications manager for the
city of Walker, and today I'mjoined by our city engineer,
scott Connors, the man of thehour.
We've got some pretty bigprojects a big project that is
definitely coming up in 2025here.
But, scott, thank you so muchfor being here and tell us, kind
(00:48):
of high level, a little bitwhat the engineering department
does for the city of Walker.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
First, Well, we oversee the road system and a
lot of the private developments.
There's always a lot going on.
What we try to do is workbehind the scenes as much as we
possibly can.
We kind of summarize our dutieswith a three P's approach,
which is the public projects,the private projects that come
in from developers, and then thevarious programs that we have
to enact that are really behindthe scenes.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Okay, a lot to keep you guys busy.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Oh, for sure.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, 2024 was a pretty busy year.
Had a lot of infrastructure, alot of road reconstruction, but
that was all really to bring usto here and the big project of
2025, one of them, the FruitRidge Bridge.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Yeah, and 24 was the biggest year we've ever had by
far, and we did a lot ofdifferent work with Kinney
Avenue, with Bristol Avenue andthe Railroad Bridge, with Center
Drive and then finally withWalker Avenue to get that ready
for the Fruit Ridge Bridge thisyear.
So we added a traffic signal upat Form Island Walker.
That was a joint projectbetween Kent County Road
(01:50):
Commission, the City of Walkerand MDOT, believe it or not, and
that was completed at the verytail of the year to get us ready
so that this coming year, whenFruit Ridge is under
construction, Walker Avenue willbe ready, Kinney will be ready,
Bristol will be ready and we'llkind of take a lot of our
construction activity off theroads to let the city breathe a
little bit.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Yeah, that'll be nice , but until then, you know it
can be some growing pains here.
Let us know exactly what we'rekind of in for with the Fruit
Ridge Bridge.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, yeah, I think within a couple months no later
than March 31st we're going tosee that the bridge over the
highway is going to come downand that's going to be a pivotal
day because there's a lot oftraffic north and south across
that bridge, a lot of veryimportant traffic from the
industrial businesses and thenmostly from Kennewa Hills High
School, where they have a lot ofbuses and parents and students
(02:39):
coming across with facilities onboth sides of the road.
So that's really how it's goingto start is with that kind of
pain.
We're trying to remindeverybody that the pain is going
to be worth it and at the endwe're going to have a great
project for them when it opensback up.
We're going to end up withhighway interchange ramps that
are going to be lined up.
Finally, the westbound rampsare offset slightly by the AGO
(03:03):
gas station and that causes someproblems with all the Amazon
trips that come through thereand all the traffic in the gas
station, and we think that'sgoing to make that a whole lot
better along the whole corridor.
And then to the south on theeastbound highway.
The eastbound off-ramp gets offat Three Mile Road and that is
very difficult because a lot oflarge trucks are getting off to
(03:24):
go to different businesses onThree Mile and Fruit Ridge to
the north, and it's verydifficult to pull out of there
when it's busy.
Oftentimes you'll see somebodysit there for 20 minutes or so
and then take a risk to pull out, and so what we're going to do
is realign that with theeastbound off-ramp.
That'll be on Fruit Ridge andit'll be signalized, and so that
movement will get a whole loteasier.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
And you know, in addition to the truck traffic,
the motor traffic, there's goingto be also some sidewalks and
trails as well.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, and that's a really exciting part about this
is that we're going to have somesidewalk on the east side of
the road across the bridge.
We're going to make all theconnections that are needed on
the east side of the road, butthen on the west side we're
going to have an actual regionaltrail and it's really a great
link for all the different trailsystems in the area.
It's going to connect theMuscatawa and the Pioneer Trail
and the White Pine Trail,essentially to the north, with
(04:14):
the Standale Trails and KentTrails to the south, and we've
been waiting for a very longtime to have this connection so
that people from out of town cancome through and pretty much
get to wherever they want.
We'll be kind of a little bitof a hub.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yes, yes, it's kind of like that missing link, the
last little section there inorder to finish that trail
system.
Very excited for this.
It's been a long time coming aswell.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
Yeah, we're excited.
We did get a grant for about $2million to help out with that.
The budget was getting prettytight on this project and that
$2 million grant is going tomake a huge difference to allow
us to build that trail tocompletion.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Yes, and as far as, like the project itself, it's
going to be MDOT taking most ofthe work and then the city of
Walker will be kind of doingsome support work.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah, the financing was a little strange because the
$25 million that's really theseed for the project came to the
city of Walker through a stateappropriation.
So we had a little bit.
We had a pretty good hand inthe card game there in how this
comes out.
But we realized early on thatit's way better to have MDOT
actually be the designer,because most of the work is in
their right-of-way and with thehighway there is some work
(05:16):
that's city work and that isadding a center turn lane on
Fruit Ridge to the north to helpout those businesses with
people getting in and out andthen the trail itself obviously.
So we do have a role in theproject.
We're going to try to focus ourresources more on those areas,
but we're also going to help outa lot with communications and
problem solving related to theoverall project, because having
(05:37):
that bridge out of service is abig deal to all of our residents
and business owners.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, that's right.
What kind of a timeline are welooking at here?
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Well, it's going to start in March, maybe as late as
March 31st.
There may be an opportunity forthat to start early, but not as
early as we thought originally,which is around February 1st.
So we'll have a little bit of areprieve here.
But the project is going to bepretty hot and heavy throughout
the summer, with a lot ofchanges.
There's many different phasesto it, with access being
adjusted here and there, but itsure should be done by middle to
(06:10):
the end of November.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Okay, so it's going to be a little bit of a tough
summer for all of us, but we'reall in the same boat here.
That's right.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
It's going to be a real test and I think, even the
people that are working on theproject.
We're very fortunate.
Our engineers from MDOT live inthe area no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Very much, you know.
Yeah, short-term pain,long-term gain.
Sometimes the mayor likes tosay so.
Talk about detours, how we'regoing to be kind of getting
ourselves around, right so thedetour is going to be Walker
Avenue.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
I think that's the simplest way to say it.
But for some of the businesses,like if you have a business on
Fruit Ridge Road, it's going tobe a long detour because you
won't be able to go across thebridge.
If you want to go south, you'llhave to go north, the four-mile
road, or you can use NorthRidge and then east on four-mile
to Walker Avenue and then southto the Walker Interchange.
Vice versa, I guess you coulduse three-mile road to the south
(07:07):
if you're stuck on the southend of Fruit Ridge and you want
to get to the north end, butit's going to be a long detour.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Yeah, yeah it will be .
And for the schools, as youwere mentioning, kenoa Hills has
schools north and south of thatbridge there.
What is that looking like forthem?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Well, it's especially important for them because
their bus garage is on the southside as well.
So the high school and themiddle school are on the north.
You've got some elementaryschools to the south.
They're going to go through alittle bit of pain as they try
to cycle those buses back andforth, but we've reached out to
them, we've worked with them.
In fact, earlier today I saw anemail from the superintendent
asking for an update and thecommunication's been great.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
That's huge and that's what we kind of want to
get out to residents andbusinesses as much as possible.
We will be communicatingchanges and whatnot.
And how will that communicationlook like?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Well, I think a lot of it might be coming through
your office, through socialmedia updates, and from our
office we may have some directmailings.
I also suspect that this willbe kind of a heavy news story.
We'll probably be doinginterviews from time to time.
We're going to use everythingthat we have available to us to
get the word out.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Yeah, All right, and you know we appreciate that.
Again, we knew this was comingfor a while.
2025 is the year, but it'sgoing to be so much better once
it's all done.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
It'll be a great project.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Yes, and if people do have kind of questions and a
good way to reach out, who aregoing to be the point?
Speaker 3 (08:24):
people Well, I'll be the point person from the city,
MDOT will also have a pointperson, and they have a local
communications manager that cantalk to the specifics of the
project.
But I guess the beauty of thisis that we're working as a team
and so we'll have manyopportunities and resources to
help people out.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
And how does it feel for you?
You know leading a lot of theseprojects coming off a year like
2024, so much on your plate.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
What did that look like?
Kind of looking back, I'm verytired.
Yeah, that was a really roughyear last year, I think with all
the work we had it was way morethan we've ever done at least
twice as much as we've ever donebut it was important.
We had to get all that stuffdone.
We had to divide and conquer alittle bit and we feel fortunate
that it was kind of a miraclethat we got all of that stuff
done.
This coming year is going to bea different kind of year
because we're not going to bemanaging active construction
projects on our local roadnetwork like this, but we'll
(09:13):
have some other projects as well, with some water, main and
sidewalks and things to occupythe construction side of us of
the city of Walker.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
All right, well, we really appreciate it, scott.
Of course that's not the onlybig project you have.
We will be talking about theWalker Library on some other
podcasts, but of course a lot ofthe word has already been out
through the news and such.
Maybe just briefly a little bitabout what folks can expect for
that.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
The library is a great project.
It's at the center of ourcampus where the existing
library is.
We're going to be renovatingthe existing building and adding
a two-story building adjacentto it.
It's a great project.
The design has been wonderful.
We're going to create somethingthat we're calling a beacon,
that is going to speak toRemembrance Road and it's going
to pull people in.
(09:55):
And we're even working on someadjustments to the existing
campus to make the existingcampus fit with the new design,
which is very exciting.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
That's a lot on your plate, but I know you're up for
the challenge though, right.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I think so.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
All right.
Well, we appreciate that somuch.
Scott.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
You're welcome.
Of course, we're going to havea lot of information about the
Fruit Ridge Bridge coming out.
As Scott was mentioning, a lotof it will be on social media.
Doing our best, we have monthlyelectronic newsletters.
If you're not even subscribedto that, that's something that
you can take advantage ofFacebook, twitter, instagram,
linkedin, you name it.
We're going to get thatinformation out to you.
(10:29):
Thank you so much, scott.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
And we appreciate you joining us for the Maiden
Walker podcast.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Made
in Walker podcast.
If you have comments orquestions about this podcast, or
if you have suggestions forfuture episodes, we'd love to
hear from you.
Please drop us an email atpodcast at walkercity.
Made in Walker is the officialpodcast of the city of Walker,
Michigan.
You can find Made in Walkerwherever you get your podcasts.
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Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.