Peachtree Boulevard Work on Schedule

Work on the Peachtree Boulevard Phase II is on target for the scheduled completion date of Thanksgiving 2012.

Buckhead Community Improvement District project manager Brian McHugh told the CID board this week that "construction is picking up; our contractor believes he's on schedule."

The company, Infrasource, is starting to put granite medians in the middle of Peachtree Road, McHugh said. 

In a followup e-mail to Buckhead Patch, McHugh said "If you look at it now you can see the milled roadway in the center of Peachtree Road. This is for setting the median foundation below the current grade."

Work is still being done on sidewalks along Phipps Plaza. At the Buckhead CID meeting Tuesday, Executive Director Jim Durrett asked McHugh why median work is beginning when Durrett said he had understood that streetscapes on both sides of Peachtree would be completed before the medians would be started. The streetscape on the Lenox Road side of Peachtree is finished.

McHugh answered that "supply issues on the concrete pavers" for the sidewalk area around Phiipps caused that work to be put aside for the median construction.

In another issue, McHugh said "Ga. Power needs to raise two more vaults" for utilities and wants the CID to pay for the work. McHugh said that the CID wants Ga. Power to be responsbile for the cost.

Ga. Power has already raised two vaults for completed construction on the north side of Peachtree Road, besides Lenox, and now needs to raise two vaults on the south side, besides Phipps. The amount involved is $464,000.

In regard to the dispute, the contractor "wants to resolve it as soon as possible" because he would "like to get in front of the vaults," McHugh said.

He said the Georgia Department of Transportation is supporting the CID in the issue. In the third party agreement with the city of Atlanta for the work, the Buckhead CID acts as the local government, and "we take on responsibility for utilties." But the CID position is that the agreement "is not relevant" in the vault issue.

Phase I of the Peachtree Boulevard project from Maple Drive to the MARTA overpass was dedicated in March 2007. Phase II, which extends past Lenox Mall and Phipps Plaza to Roxboro Road, began in March 2010.

The CID board approved the expenditure of up to $50,000 to hire a consultant for the acquisition of right of way for five parcels of property for Phase III of the project. The board took the action to allow an inexact amount because it will not meet in September and Durrett and McHugh said they needed leeway on finding the consultant.