By Elsa Maxey
The Mayor of Fulshear, Thomas C. Kuykendall, Jr. PE, was in Missouri City this month at a city council meeting, not in his mayoral capacity, but as Vice President of CivilCorp, LLC. It was in connection with a $238,000 agreement approved by city council for engineering design services, which includes the replacement of the El Dorado Bridge over Stafford Run and Oyster Creek, and also for repairs.
The city had been provided with a preliminary engineering bridge structural report earlier this year from Costello, Inc. that it requested. It represents an analysis of the city bridges in response to the failure at the Lake Olympia Bridge, which required complete replacement.
In accordance with that bridge structural report, Public Works Development Coordinator Stephanie Russell told city council that the El Dorado Bridge over Stafford Run will be completely removed and replaced. She said a temporary golf cart bridge will be installed and later it will be used to replace the bridge between holes one and two on the El Dorado golf course. Russell said the project design will also include the installation of a hike and bike trail under the Cartwright Bridge at Oyster Creek to connect the existing Oyster Creek trail to the new trail planned for construction this year.
Bridge replacement to begin in March next year will take place simultaneously with the construction that will be underway for the Golf Pro Shop and the Community Center, Kuykendall told council members. That effort is planned with banquet and meeting accommodations at the city-owned golf course property with work set to begin this summer.
Because the Fort Bend ISD school buses use the El Dorado Bridge, there will be coordination with the school district for rerouting during construction as was previously the case when the Lake Olympia Bridge was replaced. A traffic control plan for motorists and golf cart drivers is on the drawing board for implementation during the bridge closure.