Staff photo by Fritz Busch State Highway 67 is open through Morgan now with new pavement, curb and gutter. Despite being challenged by heavy rain at times, the $24 million, three-year project is scheduled to continue to next August.

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MORGAN — Small town hospitality is alive and well in Morgan.

Just ask contract crews. They worked sun up to sun down, sometimes on Saturdays over the past two years on the three-year, $24 million street and utility project in town.

“Ladies at Morgan United Methodist Church made boxed meals for our crews. Sometimes, people gave us homemade cookies at the work site,” said Ryan Contracting Project Manager Shane Jones.

The project included a $7.5 million USDA Rural Development Grant. It began in October 2017 with water treatment plant upgrades and rebuilding stormwater mains.

The City of Morgan invested $12 million in the project, using existing funds and future city tax levies and utility funds to pay for the project instead creating assessments, project engineer Bill Helget of Bolton & Menk said.

Redwood County invested $3.5 million in road reconstruction and the Minnesota Highway Department more than $1 million in highway work in the project.

Helget said 91 percent of the sanitary sewer, 75 percent of the storm sewer and 72 percent of the water main were replaced in Morgan.

Due to heavy rainfall in the spring of 2018, one crew began working in July 2018. Four crews were working in Morgan in September 2018, Jones said.

Phase three of the project includes replacing water meters and building a new lift station and three new sewer ponds northwest of Morgan, along State Highway 67.

“Working around all the rain this spring, we were able to get in late April,” Jones said. “All the underground work will be completed this year. Most of the roads will get new curb and gutter and asphalt next year.”

Jones said the City of Morgan has been good to work with and Morgan residents have been great to work with.

“The United Methodist Church cooked us meals. Other people cooked us supper, baked pies for us and brought cookies to us. A guy even delivered us apples in his golf cart. Another guy cooked us pork chops. Our guys are very thankful for what people here did for us. They’ve helped make this fun,” Jones said. “Doing everything at once in a big project like this makes it tough to get around town at times, but we’ve been making it work. It was tough on people when we worked on Main Street, closing it down. People had to use alleys to get into stores.”

Jones said local contractors and Farmward Cooperative in Morgan have been great to work with.

Farmward Cooperative Safety and Compliance Manager Aaron Guggisberg said he was really impressed with the effort construction crews put into the project.

“They often worked late into the evening. It’s been difficult with all the rain,” Guggisberg said.

Helget said the project will be a big improvement for Morgan.

“People are looking forward to getting it done. We welcome people to stop in town and take a look,” Helget said.

Downtown Morgan appears to be vibrant. Businesses include a bank and grocery store.

Detour signs around Morgan are scheduled to be removed on Friday, Sept. 27.

Fritz Busch can be emailed at fbusch@nujournal.com.