July 14 meeting to discuss underpass designs

Should the original and historic design of the underpass on Hwy. 71 just north of downtown be rebuilt or should the facade be updated with a more modern design?

The City of Kimball will host a public forum from 5:30-7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 14, at the Kimball Event Center to introduce three designs that both modernize the underpass and incorporate it's historic aspect.

Once a bone of contention between the city and the Plains Historical Society, as well as a group call the Citizens for the Public's Right to Know and be Heard, the underpass is now a point over which these groups can compromise, according to longtime Kimball resident Larry Stahla.

"Back in the early 2000s, when the project first came around, several designs were proposed," said Stahla, a lifetime member of the Plains Historical Society. "Some of them encompassed a lot of cement work, flower beds and planting. We opposed that. We wanted the historical appearance to remain."

The designs address only the approaches from both the south and north sides of the underpass, not the structure itself. The structure belongs to the Union Pacific Rail Road.

As stated in an article from the Nov. 28, 1940 edition of The Western Nebraska Observer, the slopes were faced in just three weeks with red sandstone quarried just 23 miles south of Kimball.

"They have put together three designs that encompass some cement work, and in some cases some plantings, but approximately two-thirds of the rocks would remain on the slopes," Stahla said. "So it was a compromise between the two."

The city is rebuilding the underpass in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration along with the Nebraska Department of Roads with construction planned for 2017.

"Any one of the three will retain two-thirds of the rocks and then there is some signage that will be worked into it," Stahla said. "There will be new sidewalks, new railing and some lighting in three similar, but different designs."

Stahla said it looks like the project will finally become a reality after many years and he encourages the public to attend the meeting to voice their opinion.

Concern in the early to mid 1900s over the safety of the railroad crossing prompted the city council to petition the United State Bureau of Public Roads for an underpass after plans for an overpass were refused by the State of Nebraska, according to a history of the underpass written by longtime resident Marcia Buescher.

Originally built in the late 1930s and into the early 1940s, the underpass was the more cost efficient choice to an overpass.

"It has been a long awaited project to be completed," Stahla said. "It looks like it is really going to happen now."