Dubuque City Council members voted, 7-0, to approve an application for a $175,000 Land and Water Conservation Fund grant to connect Bee Branch Creek trails to a crossing beneath the railroad tracks along Garfield Avenue.
Council members approved a $131,000 easement with Canadian Pacific Railway in December to install six 8-foot culverts under the company’s Garfield Avenue railyard. That is expected to up the stormwater system’s capacity from a 75-year flood event to a 500-year flood event.
It also would render two existing box culverts obsolete, opening the way for pedestrian traffic beneath the railyard.
The $470,000 project would repair and upgrade the existing culverts, complete with lighting and surveillance cameras, and connect them to existing Upper and Lower Bee Branch Greenway trail sections.