Hall Street undergoes construction

By ERIC W. NORRIS

Hays Daily News

In 2004 a major thoroughfare in Hays under went a thorough overhaul.

April 2004 saw the beginning of a nearly 10-month long project to widen, rework and repave Hall Street from 27th to 12th and Elm Street from 12th to Eighth.

The construction cost $2.56 million, 80 percent of which was paid for by the Kansas Department of Transportation through a cost-share grant.

The grant left the city to cover the remaining 20 percent, or $512,000.

Since the demolition and construction of Hall Street would require that large sections of the street would be closed, crews had to time street closures with August school openings.

Thomas More Prep-Marian High School and O'Loughlin Elementary are both located along Hall Street.

To make this accommodation, the project was broken into three phases, where parts of construction would be completed at different times instead of working on the project as a whole.

The street from Eighth to 27th was opened with all three lights functional the last week in January 2005. Though all of the streets were opened, crews still needed to complete finishing work such as sidewalks and drive entrances.

Also, permanent pavement markings must be added to the street, but crews will have to wait until spring weather allows for several days in a row of moderately warm temperatures.

Assistant Director of Public Works John Braun said the city undertook the project with two main objections in mind.

The first was to create a protected turning lane down the center of Hall Street for traffic making left-hand turns.

The street was reconstructed to a consistent 45-foot width, and pavement markings altered the driving lanes, establishing three lanes where there was once two wide lanes.

The second objective was to create a workable solution to the five-way intersection where Hall Street ended at the 12th and Elm intersection.

This resulted in the purchase of three private properties by the city south of 13th Street. Buildings on the properties were demolished to create a gentle curve in the road north of 12th Street where Hall becomes Elm.

One of three new camera-activated stoplights was erected at the 13th and Hall intersection, and the newly constructed road left a large green space south of the new stoplight.

The Hays Beautification Committee plans on using the space for public art.

The 27th and Hall intersection also received a new stoplight, and the traffic signal at Eighth and Elm was replaced and upgraded.

The city took advantage of the demolition work to replace waterlines under the street.

“Every waterline that had new pavement poured over it was replaced,” Braun said. “We decide to replace them as we were tearing up old concrete, instead of having to tear up the new pavement sometime in the near future.”

Braun said the 4-inch lines running under the street were upwards of 80 years old. Those lines were upgraded to 8-inch lines, and in some cases 12-inch lines were installed.

Upgrading the waterlines also included replacing fire hydrants and adding hydrants to reduce the space between them.

The waterline improvement part of the Hall Street project cost the city $232,000.

Reporter Eric Norris can be reached at (785) 628-1081, ext. 143, or by e-mail at

enorris@dailynews.net.