Work on a new bridge over Gravois Creek on Green Park Road is anticipated to be “substantially complete” next week, City Administrator/City Clerk Zella Pope told the Board of Aldermen last week.

Work on the new bridge and the reconstruction of a roughly 6,000-foot stretch of Green Park Road from Tesson Ferry Road to Lin Valle Drive began this spring.

Excessive rainfall and flooding have hampered work on the new bridge, which previously had been projected to open to traffic by Sept. 1.

“It is anticipated that this project will be substantially complete within 14 days of today,” Pope told the board Sept. 19, reading an email from Mark Payken of Payken Consulting.

Payken initially was hired by the city to perform right-of-way acquisition for the project. His role since has expanded to include project management and the responsibilities a director of public works or city engineer normally would handle.

In his email, Payken wrote that the bridge contractor, Concrete Strategies of Overland, “has completed the backfill of the completed box culvert with crushed limestone rock. The concrete pavement driving surface was placed last Friday (Sept. 16). The construction of the connecting storm sewers has been completed. The barrier walls will be constructed this week.

“One retaining wall is complete except for the capstone and the other retaining wall is 80 percent complete but was held up by the recent rains,” Payken wrote.

Work still to be completed, according to Payken, includes completion of the modular block retaining wall, placement of stone revetment to prevent creek bank erosion and site restoration.

Payken’s email also included an update on the reconstruction of Green Park Road.

The road contractor, L. Krupp Construction Inc. of Ballwin, began excavation in mid-August ‘to construct the new curb and gutter at the Lin Valle end of Green Park Road,” Payken wrote in his email.

At the same time, the Missouri American Water Co., or MoAm, began relocating its waterline, according to Payken.

Payken met with Krupp and MoAm representatives “to discuss what MoAm needed in the way of survey staking to complete their relocation work. Once that was resolved, MoAm will continue to work to relocate their infrastructure,” he wrote.

“Currently almost 2,000 feet — approximately 20 percent — of concrete curb and gutter has been completed,” Payken wrote. “Krupp will proceed west toward Kohrs at which time MoAm should have completed their work at Kohrs. Storm sewer construction is 80 percent complete. Green Park Road has been excavated from Lin Valle to just past the railroad bridge, with base rock and asphalt to be complete this week.”

Green Park Road is being widened with two extra feet of lanes on each side to make 12-foot lanes.

Other improvements include a new pedestrian pathway along the road’s north side, an additional right-turn lane at the road’s intersection with Tesson Ferry Road and a new left-turn lane at Antrill Drive.

Plans also call for eliminating drop-offs and ditches from the road and replacing them with vertical curbs on each side.

Because the curbing will replace ditches on each side of the road, a storm sewer is being installed across the road’s length.

Substantial grade changes also will be made at the road’s intersections with Kohrs Lane, Mueller Road and Lisa Marie Court to improve sight-line visibility and provide better curb alignment.

City officials anticipate the Green Park Road project will be completed by the end of the year.

The bridge project also will include the reconstruction of roughly 200 feet of Green Park Road.

Work to be performed on Green Park Road as part of the bridge project includes the replacement of curbing, landscaping and driveway aprons, the installation of a new asphalt pedestrian path and the installation of new storm sewers.

The city’s 2011 budget projects the total cost of the redevelopment of Green Park Road, including the bridge replacement, at $3,080,740.

Eighty percent of the road construction will be funded through a federal grant approved in 2003 and 80 percent of the bridge placement will be funded through a federal grant approved in 2006.

The city’s 2011 budget lists grant revenue totaling $2,464,592.