Amador County – Sutter Creek City Council on Monday awarded a $1.6 million contract to realign Prospect Drive with Bowers Drive on Sutter Hill.

The Council followed city engineer Gary Ghio’s recommendation to award the Prospect Drive realignment project to George Reed Construction for his winning bid of $1.6 million, edging out Vinciguerra Construction’s $1.7 million and Doug Veerkamp’s bid of $1.9 million. The project will build a new intersection to align Bowers Drive with a newly built extension of Prospect Drive, to make a T-intersection. The project funding through Amador County Transportation Commission’s Regional Traffic Mitigation Fee program will run short of paying for signalization of the intersection.

Councilman Tim Murphy said ACTC and the Regional Traffic Mitigation fee program have approved a loan to the city to complete the signalization, but ACTC Executive Director Charles Field must go to member entities of ACTC to get their approval.

In public comment, former Councilman Pat Crosby said “the realignment project has been in the works for a long time and the drug store has labored under really trying conditions to try to get people in and out.” Walgreens opened at the corner of Ridge Road and Highway 49 in August 2010.

Crosby said Walgreens has been the anchor of the mall, and he did not know where the grocery store was that also planned a franchise there.

The Council voted 4-0 to authorize City Manager Sean Rabe to sign a contract and award the bid to George Reed Construction.

Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.