A project in Jefferson that has been two years in the making may finally come to fruition.

The Jefferson City Council approved a $38,297 contract with Caliber Concrete in Adair to repave the north alleyway of the downtown square. That is also the area where a project by Jefferson Matters: Main Street began to make “Arch Alley.” Tower View Team Chair Deb McGinn says Arch Alley will include three 19-foot metal arches based on the architectural designs of the downtown buildings, as well as aluminum casts that were originally designed by community members as well as students from Greene County and Paton Churdan and built by local artist David Williamson.

City Administrator Mike Palmer says the alleyway project will include removal and additional concrete for the footings for the metal arches. Palmer notes the alley project was bid together as a package, but separately from another project to pave the City Hall parking lot. However, Palmer says the bid for the parking lot was over their price range of $74,470.

“The alley was affordable for us. We had about $60,000 left in bond money. What money that’s left over is on the parking lot, either try to do just what we can (and) hopefully maybe in house we can do a lot of it. It might take a few years to do some of this but we can just keep chipping away with it over time.”

The Arch Alley project received a $52,000 grant from Grow Greene County Gaming Corporation. However, McGinn says there was an issue when they were putting the footings in place and unknown material was discovered under the concrete surface that crews couldn’t penetrate through. She is excited to get this project completed.

“Arch Alley is really going to be telling the story of us through imagery and also with a community written poem. So like I said it’s just really going to be telling the story of us.”

McGinn anticipates completing the project late this fall or early next spring.