Coralville wrapping up flood work

CORALVILLE - While larger towns like Iowa City and Cedar Rapids still have several of their biggest flood-related projects left to do, Coralville is at the end of its list.

Work started this fall on a $12 million project that includes elevating a portion of the Cedar Rapids and Iowa City Railroad behind First Avenue and Highway 6, a stretch that was under several feet of water in the 2008 flood.

It is the last publicly funded project the city has planned, although there are a couple more it wants to do but doesn't yet have funding for.

“We were just trying to be aggressive,” City Engineer Dan Holderness said. “There are a lot of folks who have yet to begin their projects.”

That's not to suggest Iowa City and the University of Iowa, the two other entities in Johnson County that saw extensive flood damage in 2008, have been sitting around.

Part of it is scope. Holderness cited eight flood projects totaling

$55.4 million for Coralville. Iowa City has 16 projects costing an estimated $146 million.

The latest UI estimate on damage and recovery costs is $862.5 million, which includes replacing Hancher Auditorium, the School of Music and the Art Building.

Like Cedar Rapids, both the UI and Iowa City have had extensive dealings with the federal government and the accompanying requirements and paperwork.

For example, Iowa City is in month 24 of what was to be an 18-month review of the environmental effects of its planned elevation of Dubuque Street and Park Road bridge, which were under water in 2008. It's a federal requirement, and Iowa City Public Works Director Rick Fosse said while the federal and state agencies that are involved probably are busy from other flood projects, it's not the turnaround the city wanted.

The rule of thumb is a federal grant needs to be at least 5 percent of a project's total price tag to make up for the additional costs and time necessary to meet federal requirements, Fosse said.

The city has received $10.5 million in outside funding for the $32 million street and bridge project, scheduled to be finished in 2015.

UI dispute

The UI was in a months-long dispute this year with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General, which said the federal government should not pay to replace flood-damaged Hancher Auditorium, the School of Music and Art Building at new locations.

About $83 million was at stake, and Homeland Security in October sided with the UI. Officials said they continued design work while the funding was in question and did not fall behind schedule. The projects are to be completed in late 2015 and early 2016.

Iowa City hit a significant milestone this past summer by wrapping up the flood buyout program. In all, 93 homes near the Iowa River were purchased and demolished in what Fosse considers the only foolproof flood-mitigation strategy.

“That's 93 homes that we won't need to worry about in the next flooding event,” he said.

The City Council this fall, however, rejected a proposed levee along Taft Speedway because it would have left nine homes, whose owner refused buyout offers, between the levee and the Iowa River.

The city this year got started on the $54.8 million relocation of the flood-prone north wastewater treatment plant to the south plant, which is being expanded. It's the largest public works project in city history in terms of cost. The expansion is to be finished in 2014.

In Coralville, current efforts have been helped by a decision during the 2008 flood to hire firms to monitor flooding and then review that information afterward to create a plan on how to respond, said Holderness, the city engineer.

The railroad elevation, the last major project in the pipeline, is to be mostly done by the end of 2013.

“We feel we're in a lot better position to handle any kind of flood in the future,” Holderness said.