Return to Archived Stories

The estimates were released to the local task force during an hour-long meeting on Tuesday, May 11.

Five routes are still under consideration -Êno build, improving the through-town route, and three bypass options (east, far west, and west). Cost estimates for the two through-town routes have dropped, while cost estimates for all three bypass routes have increased, with a four-lane bypass with an interchange with Highway 55 now expected to cost close to $30 million.

The cost estimates for the bypass routes have increased in large measure due to the inclusion of turnback costs. That is the cost to the state of upgrading the existing highway and turning it back to the county or city along with maintenance costs. All three bypasses currently leave the existing highway route by the Stearns-Kandiyohi border and do not rejoin the road until a mile east of Paynesville, meaning the state would be responsible for turning back several miles of road.

The Highway 23 project is expected to receive $5 million in federal funding as a high-priority project, getting $3 million from the Sixth Congressional District (Mark Kennedy, R, Watertown) and $2 million from the Seventh Congressional District (Collin Peterson, D, Detroit Lakes). This money will need to be used during the six-year life of the federal highway bill, so MnDOT is currently projecting to start this project in 2007 or 2008. But MnDOT will either need to find additional funding for the project or scale it back dramatically.

And MnDOT still needs to decide on the future route. MnDOT hopes to have the draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) completed this summer.

MnDOT engineer Lowell Flaten told the task force last week that MnDOT's design people were starting to examine the west bypass, but that all five routes were still under consideration in the draft EIS.

"We're looking at the west real closely," he said.

A large portion of last week's meeting with the task force was spent discussing an option for the west bypass. Currently, the plan calls for a bridge over Main Street and an at-grade intersection by the Paynesville Inn on the west side of town, with possibly a slip exit from eastbound 23 as it enters Paynesville from the west.

MnDOT is considering putting the bridge and the intersection by the inn, across from the high school. This would require realigning Cemetery Road, which turns into Main Street, to the south, eliminating the last S-curve, and have it intersect the new highway roughly across from the north entrance to the high school parking lot.

MnDOT is looking at an option for the west bypass on the west side of town. Instead of having a bridge over Main Street and an at-grade intersection by the Paynesville Inn (top map), MnDOT is examining putting both the bridge and intersection at the Paynesville Inn (bottom map). This would require realigning Cemetery Road to the south and cutting Main Street in half, making it a cul de sac both to the east and west of the new highway. MnDOT has not decided on a preferred alternative for Highway 23, yet. A decision is still expected this summer.

Doing this, though, would cut Main Street in half. With no through traffic on Main Street, both ends would become cul de sacs. On the west side, motorists cut off by the new highway from town would need to head west on Main Street, intersect with the redesigned Cemetery Road, and come into town further south through the new intersection.

The task force had no concensus on this issue, and MnDOT will continue to work on the design.

Studies on contaminated properties along the routes and impacts to architectural/historical sites along the routes are still being done. Once these are done, MnDOT and its consulting engineers will need to agree on a preferred alternative and the draft EIS will be ready for publication.