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Redevelopment of Toomers Corner (City of Auburn)

autigeremt

By autigeremt
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autigeremt Founding Father

autigeremt 6,569

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Webcam ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2kIiOHUGHE

The project, which is currently budgeted at $1.6 million and for which the city is accepting bids until March 26, is expected to begin on April 20 and be finished by Aug. 17, the first day of classes at Auburn University.

Before transforming the intersection, the city will focus on the removal of sidewalks on both sides of North College Street down to the mid-street crosswalk, and on both sides of Magnolia Avenue down to the Compass Bank entrance east of College, and on one side of the street down to the entrance behind The Vault.

Contractors are expected to work on one corner at a time.

The sidewalks, steps and handicap ramps will be redone to make them more ADA compliant, although they will remain two-tiered on the east side of College Street.

"It won't be as big a drop off as it was before," said Public Works Director Jeff Ramsey, who has taken a personal interest in the project and did the redesign of the corner. "I want to make sure it's right."

The city will also be doing extensive work under the sidewalks along College and Magnolia, which includes electrical work and extending water lines.

The affected stars on the Tiger Trail walk of fame will be removed, stored and re-installed by the contractors.

The project is expected to cause "significant disruption" for traffic flow and downtown parking, according to Kevin Cowper, assistant city manager.

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The actual work on Toomer's Corner will include removing rails and about six parking spaces around the corners to open them up.

The intersection and sidewalks will also be raised to the level of the corners, and bollards will be installed to protect pedestrians.

"It's kind of one big event space, so that you're not stepping off the curb," Ramsey said. "We're actually increasing the spaces at the corners to provide more space for outdoor dining and a place where people can gather.

"We're also putting things in so that if we do have a band we have electrical connections already prepared for them, so they can just plug in and not have to bring a generator to that intersection."

The intersection and sidewalks will consist of colored, inlaid brick, and the intersection will also feature a permanent brick-inlaid tiger paw.

The city also plans to install double-sided brick seat walls, like those on the university's corner of the intersection, on each corner around new tree wells, which will utilize Silva Cells.

The wells will sit empty until the dormant season in late fall or early winter when the city plans on planting new trees. The actual species of the trees is yet to be determined, although Cowper says they will complement the new live oaks.

The city will also be installing two new decorative traffic signal poles and mast arms on the Vault and Compass Bank corners. The benches and traffic poles may also be outfitted with LED lighting.

"They can actually change colors, so during the football game we may have them orange and blue," Ramsey said. "We’re even

looking when we put the traffic signals up at having some LED lights there that can shine down and change the color of light in the intersection."

In addition to traffic flow and parking, the project will also have an impact on university events like Camp War Eagle and city events like the SummerNight Downtown Art Walk, which has been rescheduled for October and will be renamed the Indian SummerNight Art Walk.

"I think that's just kind of taking a lemons-into-lemonade kind of approach," Cowper said. "We’re going to have a lot of construction, and we’re going to embrace that fact and work with what we’ve got and make the best out of it and keep encouraging people to come downtown to shop.

"When we get through it, we will have a very, very nice intersection that the entire Auburn Nation is going to be proud of and going to want to come and visit and come attend events at."

Cowper said the wires that fans rolled for the past two years have already come down, and there are no plans to re-install them for football season. The university is asking Auburn fans not to roll the two new Auburn Oaks until the fall of 2016.

"We definitely want to keep the tradition alive and well at Toomer’s Corner, but certainly 2015 is going to be a year where at least rolling the trees at Toomer’s Corner is going to be off limits," Cowper said. "This is kind of a once-in-a-lifetime project. I think things lined up in Auburn for this to be the right time for a project of this magnitude.

"This is an iconic community space, and I think we want to have it at a level where people come to it, it looks very nice, and it’s what they expect to see."

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http://www.auburnvil...16363c5201.html

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cooltigger21 Founding Father

cooltigger21 0

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So what do we roll for victories in 2015?

They'll have something in place I'm sure. I think I read thst they were going to have some kind of temporary metal structure set up for football season.
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WarEagle84 Founding Father

WarEagle84 0

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So what do we roll for victories in 2015?

They'll have something in place I'm sure. I think I read thst they were going to have some kind of temporary metal structure set up for football season.

And there's always the rest of the trees in Samford Park.

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AUBwins Founding Father

AUBwins 10,064

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So what do we roll for victories in 2015?

Bammers. Bring bammer and roll em.

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RunInRed Founding Father

RunInRed 16,360

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Red how is the tree looking that was slow coming around this spring? Does it look like it is going to make it?

Still not looking great. Here's the latest (official) update ...

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cooltigger21 Founding Father

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That is going to look spectacular when it's finished. I definitely need to get to at least one game this fall so I can see all the upgrades and that big video board.

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