If you are driving along Barry Road near Line Creek Parkway you might want to slow down for a couple of reasons. First, KCMO PD runs a pretty lucrative speed trap hiding at Allenton Drive in the Meadows subdivision. Second, someone built a parkway without a left turn lane for Barry Road and it's hard to see when approaching due to the hills. Third, construction for the Line Creek Trail is digging a big hole right next to the road.
Why?
When Barry Road was widened and improved in the late 1980's, the street was built one side at a time (I speculate based on old plans I have come across). At Line Creek Parkway, the north half of the road was built first and a temporary bypass to the south to avoid detouring. The south side of the road was built a year or two later. This was done due to funding constraints I assume.
Underneath Barry Road, a double cell reinforced concrete box culvert was constructed in two phases. This culvert is shown below. The left/west cell is going to have a new floor installed and be painted white so that the Line Creek Trail can go underneath Barry Road. The new floor will make the trail surface smooth and the white paint will reflect light making it lighter than it is today. The contractor has started power washing and preparing the surface.
While that seems easy enough, someone designing the project had a great idea to connect the storm pipes and inlets directly into the concrete box culverts. The storm water for the south side of Barry drains into that left/west cell shown with a 24" concrete pipe that pokes through the left side and sticks out into the culvert. If you squint hard enough in the picture above, one can see someone sawing the pipe and the metal sparks.
In order to use the culvert as an underpass, modifications need to be done to the system so that the 24" pipe doesn't dump water on the trail and instead drains to the south. The design of the drainage system makes the storm inlets at this point extremely tall (20-25'). The contractor has to dig down to the low point on the inlet where the storm pipe enters. He will then drill a hole in the storm inlet so that a new outlet pipe can be installed. After that storm pipe is installed, the inlet has to be filled with concrete to the elevation of the new pipe so water drains. That all seems simple but there is a set of major telecommunications lines and a waterline in the way. This shot below is standing on the inlet looking to the south. As you can see, the trench is deep enough to hide a decent sized excavator. Note the telecom lines hanging in air that the operator has to work around.
I will try and describe how a user can expect to use the tunnel. The screen shot below from MapMyRide™ account is a weak attempt at showing it graphically.
The trail will follow along the east bank of Line Creek which is about 10-15' higher than the stream. The trail will curve westerly around the Little Shack on Barry Road, go over the top of the culvert, wind around southerly and descend to enter the tunnel. That's why there is the red loop on the aerial below.
The cost and headache of going under Barry Road is way cheaper than a traffic signal at Line Creek Parkway. Also, it is a million times safer as one doesn't have to cross Barry Road with its 55+ mph travel speeds. Those of you with kids on the trail know how stressful it is to cross traffic at 68th Street.
It also provides users with another underpass of a major street. When fully complete, one will be able to go from the casino in Riverside to the north side of Barry Road without having to interact with cars and cross a street.
I know that a lot of you are using the graded trail now but be careful around any fencing or any areas where you cannot see what is happening. The best thing to do is wait a few months and let the job get done for safe usage.
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