CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Some of the roads in the area around La Palmera Mall will be getting some attention over the next several days, meaning drivers will need to be paying attention.
Most are aware of the Bond Project work being done on Airline Road in front of the Gulfway Shopping Center. The good news is, that should be completed by the middle of October and will come with new sidewalks, curbs and gutters in addition to a brand new road.
However, anyone who has become used to temporarily avoiding that area by using any of the nearby streets, may need to rethink their route.
Work is beginning in two spots today – the first, being that stretch of Staples Street that runs alongside the mall between McArdle Road and S.P.I.D.
Brett Van Hazel with the city of Corpus Christi’s Engineering Department says this one is actually Phase 2 of a mill and overlay project. That means with the exception of this Friday and Saturday, some of the lanes on that street will be shut down every night from 8 p.m. until 6 a.m.
“For this section, it’s going to be a mill,” says Van Hazel. “They’re going to come in and remove two inches of the existing roadway and put back two inches of new roadway, and that will happen during the night for the next two weeks.”
Now, if you do most of your driving during the daylight hours, it’s that piece of Weber Road between McArdle and S.P.I.D. that you’ll need to watch out for.
Starting today and for about the next week, crews will be installing a new asphalt roadway there, with various lanes closed from 8:30 each morning until 4:30 each afternoon.
If you’re wondering whether any of this is really needed, Van Hazel says it is actually part of the city’s Street Preventative Maintenance Program.
According to Van Hazel, “We actually go in and do full-depth reconstruction, so those areas where you may see a big pothole forming, those are the kind of areas that we go into and we actually do additional repairs to make sure that the subgrade is in a stable condition so we don’t have those failures in the future.”
As always, motorists are advised to make safety a top priority by being patient and either following the detour signs or looking for an alternate route.