(Photo by Phyllis McCabe)
A plan to replace a major intersection in Uptown Kingston with a roundabout has been postponed after state officials rejected all the bids submitted for it.
Work on the two-year project has been pushed back a full year, with completion now anticipated for the fall of 2021.
The proposal to replace the intersection of I-587, Albany Avenue and Broadway with a roundabout has been in the works since 2014. Traffic experts believe a traffic circle at the site would ease congestion and improve safety at the notoriously tangled intersection. But the proposal has faced repeated delays and ballooning costs. Estimates on the cost of the project, initially set at $7 million, currently are more than $13 million. The project was slated to start in 2018 and be complete by 2020.
The latest delay comes after the state Department of Transportation, which is funding and overseeing the project, opted to reject all of the bids submitted in response to the agency’s September 2018 request.
“The New York State Department of Transportation anticipates putting the Kingston roundabout reconstruction project back out to bid in September. The project is scheduled for completion in fall 2021,” wrote DOT spokeswoman Heather Pillsworth in an email. “The department rejected all bids in order to re-examine the project and associated costs.”
Pillsworth did not say why the DOT nixed the bids. But Kingston Mayor Steve Noble said he believes it was because the quotes came in higher than the project’s budget. Noble said the delay would also put off a plan to replace sewer and water infrastructure at the site.
