FARMINGTON — Because of rising construction costs, the city of Farmington has decided to discard plans for a pedestrian tunnel underneath 400 West by the Lagoon Campground.

“It turned out that construction was going to be a really costly exercise, and even though we priced it out twice, each time we priced it the cost went up and the news never got any better,” said city council member Rick Dutson. “The cost was significantly over-budgeted, but it would have been hard on the city anyway because constructing a tunnel is a costly exercise.”

The original bid for the tunnel project cost $500,000 when it was proposed several years ago, but it was put on hold when the Legacy Parkway was delayed as well. When the project was approved in the fall for summer construction, estimates were up to $615,000, and the latest bids are reported to now cost more than $750,000.

“The building materials were too costly and we could no longer afford the project under the funds we received from UDOT through the Federal Highway Administration,” said City Planner David Petersen.

With construction costs on the upswing, Dutson and other council members have decided to re-engineer the project and brainstorm for other alternatives, as opposed to forgetting about the project altogether.

“We will just have to come up with other ideas instead of a tunnel as alternatives, and then send the engineers back to the drawing table,” he said. “We will try and find alternatives for a safe passage going over the road instead. Maybe we can incorporate crosswalks with flashing lights or something in the road to purposely cause traffic to slow down.”

Other proposed ideas have included adjusting the trail so it doesn’t cross at 400 West or resurfacing curbs and gutters along the trail.

“The most important thing is to make sure we have a safe pedestrian crossing and have something safer than we had before,” Petersen said. “We will make sure to cost it out better and not exceed the budget this time.”

Doug Radunich