Auburn spotlights $13 million Auburn Way South rebuild and updates on 40 capital projects

At a March 24 Auburn City Council study session, city public works staff reviewed the city’s quarterly capital project status report and gave a detailed briefing on the Auburn Way South Corridor project, a reconstruction and safety upgrade with an approximate $13,000,000 budget.

The update matters because the city has 40 active capital projects across multiple departments and the Auburn Way South work will add lanes, sidewalks, transit pullouts and storm and water main upgrades along a heavily traveled corridor that serves schools, downtown Auburn and the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe’s event center and casino.

“Currently, we have 40 active capital projects, totaling total project value of over a hundred and $30,000,000,” Tom Mount Larson, senior project engineer, told the council while introducing the capital projects status (CPS) report. He said 28 projects are in design and 12 are in construction. The CPS packet, he said, lists each project number, manager, estimated total cost, grant awards when applicable, and anticipated construction start and finish dates.

Jeffrey Bender, senior project engineer, led the Auburn Way South presentation. He said the corridor—between Hemlock Street on the west and Redwood Court on the east—lacks continuous sidewalks and crossings, has limited lighting and unimproved bus stops, and suffers congestion and serious-injury crashes. The project scope includes widening the…