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City, company resolve bridge issue
YOUNGSTOWN
A problem building an access road to benefit V&M Star’s $650 million expansion project has been averted.
An unused bridge that crosses over Division Street needs to be demolished as part of the construction of the main access road to the expansion.
The problem was that the Brier Hill Slag Co. contends half of the bridge is on the company’s property. The city disagreed, saying the entire bridge is on city property.
If the issue hadn’t been resolved, it would have delayed the bridge demolition, city officials say.
But the two sides came to an agreement.
The city’s board of control voted at a special meeting Thursday to pay $10,000 to Brier Hill Slag. The company OK’d the deal a few days earlier.
The $10,000 is about half of the estimated value of the resale of scrap salvaged from the bridge’s demolition, according to the settlement agreement between the city and the company.
“It’s an easement agreement,” said city Finance Director David Bozanich, a board of control member. “We’re not acknowledging or disputing ownership.”
The easement is temporary while demolition of the four tunnels and bridges along Roger Lindgren Way, the main access road to the V&M expansion location, is occurring, Bozanich said.
The city will pay Brier Hill but be reimbursed for the $10,000 by V&M Star, Bozanich said.
The city hired A.P. O’Horo of Liberty in September for $747,000 to demolish the four tunnels and the bridges over them. V&M also is reimbursing the city for that expense.
V&M officials expect the expansion project, near the company’s Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard facility, to be done between October and December 2011.
V&M manufactures seamless tubes for the gas and oil industry.