Road work notification for GJ commuters

A waterline replacement project is taking place in Grand Junction this month.

The construction will impact traffic on Grand Avenue from 5th Street to 2nd Street.

Crews are gutting old pipes and valves from the city's water distribution system.

Both northbound and southbound traffic is being diverted into one lane between 2nd and 5th Street.

Northbound traffic on 5th Street wasn't able to commute through the intersection at Grand Avenue on Thursday, and because crews came into some trouble, the intersection may be closed to northbound traffic on 5th Street again Friday.

"It's a little slower than we had anticipated, we've run into extremely thick asphalt that we weren't expecting and also we're running into some old valves that aren't properly sealing," said Lee Cooper, Project Engineer for the city of Grand Junction.

"That's one of the reasons we're doing this waterline project, is to get rid of the old valves that aren't properly sealing, and get new plastic pipe in and new epoxy-coated valves," said Cooper.

According to city officials, the average age of the waterlines being replaced is 48 years. And the type of pipes they are, both steel and ductile iron pipe, typically last 50 years.

Lee said you can expect to see road work along Grand Avenue from 2nd Street to 5th Street for at least the next four weeks.