YOUNGSTOWN — The city’s board of control signed an $8.25 million contract for a major water main and lead line replacement project and a $1.7 million contract to rehabilitate the South Avenue Bridge.

The board approved both contracts 3-0 at Thursday’s meeting.

The water project was estimated to cost $16.78 million. J.S. Bova Excavating LLC’s low bid of $8,247,116, approved Thursday, was less than half of the estimated cost, leaving Water Commissioner Harry L. Johnson to say he was “flabbergasted” when bids were opened April 18.

The next lowest bid of four submitted was $9,914,780 from Rudzik Excavating Inc. of Struthers.

The two other bids also were under the estimate: $10,249,680 from Marucci & Gaffney Excavating Co. of Youngstown and $14,573,649 from S.E.T. Inc. of Lowellville.

The project includes the replacement of more than 10,000 linear feet of lead waterlines and a water main to more than 720 homes in the Buckeye Plat neighborhood on the city’s southeast side.

The project, which is being done simultaneously in two phases, should start in June or July, Johnson said. One phase will take 11 months to complete while the other will take 18 months.

The city is borrowing the money from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency with 50% of it forgiven upon the project’s completion.

While the water project was well under the estimate, both bids to rehabilitate the small South Avenue Bridge were higher than the estimate.

The estimate for the project was $1,635,232.

The low bid, opened April 25 and awarded Thursday by the board, was $1,695,258 from Marucci & Gaffney Excavating Co. of Youngstown. The only other bid for the job was $2,109,000 from A.P. O’Horo of Liberty.

The city received a $1,065,900 state grant for the project.

Because of the need to relocate gas lines, the project won’t start until spring 2026 and take about four months to complete.

The small bridge goes over the Youngstown and Southeastern Railroad Co. train line just south of the larger Peace Officers Memorial Bridge that crosses the Mahoning River.

During construction, the section of South Avenue near the bridge will be closed to vehicular and pedestrian traffic with detours. South Avenue is one of the city’s main corridors.

The vehicular detour will be 3 miles in length and use Williamson Avenue, Market Street and Indianola Avenue. The pedestrian detour will be 0.7 of a mile in length and use Williamson Avenue, Gibson Street and Dorothy Avenue.

Access will be maintained to all adjacent properties, residences, businesses and intersecting side streets during the project. That includes the old South Side Park, which is not open to the public, and the South Side Veterans Memorial.

The work includes rehabilitating the bridge’s substructure, refacing the abutments, replacing the approach slabs that connect the roadway pavement to the bridge as well as the guardrails, sidewalks, bridge railings, curbs and pavement markings.

The bridge was constructed in 1957 and had major rehabilitation work done to it in 1990. It underwent further improvement work in 2015.

The bridge is listed as “poor” and “structurally deficient” by the Federal Highway Administration.

The FHA’s National Bridge Inventory report states the structure is “intolerable requiring high priority of corrective action” while the substructure has a loss of a section or deterioration.

The report added about the substructure: “Local failures are possible. Fatigue cracks in steel or shear cracks in concrete may be present.”

Also, the bridge railings and guardrail do “not meet current acceptable standards or a safety feature is required and none is provided,” according to the report. About 9,100 vehicles use the bridge daily.

Of Ohio’s 29,960 bridges, about 5% are classified as structurally deficient.