City cuts pedestrian underpass from Hastings redesign
The soon-to-begin Hastings Way reconstruction project was to include a pedestrian underpass at Fenwick Avenue (Regis High School). Reporting from last night’s City Council meeting, the 
L-T says that’s no longer the case. From the article ...
Citing cost concerns as final bids for the 1.41-mile project came in at $10.91 million -- more than January's $10.47 million estimate -- the Eau Claire City Council voted 6-2 against the pedestrian underpass at Fenwick Avenue, thereby cutting $532,000 from the project.
"We have a $10 million project here," Councilman Dave Duax said. "These things are nice, but not absolutely necessary."
Driving up the cost were two chunks of land the city would need to buy to build the thing.
In the absence of the underpass, we really hope the rest of the redesign will help slow traffic enough to make crossing Hastings on foot seem less scary. Of course, some have argued that seeing people walking and biking across a street on a regular basis is a great way to slow traffic all by itself: scroll down to "An Underpass?"
