Work on stimulus-funded projects begins

With jackhammer and chisel, Edward Lenhart and Mark Arnold attacked a flaking concrete wall beneath I-295 in Barrington, preparing the bridge for major repairs this year.

Lenhart, of Salem, N.J., and Arnold, of Atlantic City, are two of the first workers on New Jersey's biggest highway project supported by the federal economic-stimulus program.

Crews starting the three-year, $69 million project to repave and rebuild I-295 in Camden and Gloucester Counties represent the first local trickle in what is supposed to be a flood of highway jobs and money from Washington to hard-pressed states and towns.

When President Obama signed the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in February, he said, "We have begun the essential work of keeping the American dream alive in our time."

In the months since, the nation has lost two million more jobs, and the unemployment rate has risen to 9.7 percent. Some economists and labor leaders are clamoring for more stimulus spending, while many Republicans in Congress are denouncing the stimulus package as an expensive failure.

For South Jersey residents, some of the most visible evidence of the stimulus is just now sprouting along the 6.6-mile stretch of I-295 between West Deptford and Cherry Hill.

Crews are erecting orange silt fences to protect wetlands and putting in new drainage boxes. On Monday night, they will start rebuilding the highway shoulders on the north end of the work zone as they prepare to shift traffic lanes.

In September, ironworkers will start to redeck five I-295 bridges in the Barrington area.

"This is a much-needed rehabilitation project that will preserve a critical roadway, boost the economy, and create jobs," Gov. Corzine said in a statement.

But it's hard to determine exactly how many jobs the work will create or how much money will be pumped into the local economy.

An average of about 120 workers will be employed daily on the I-295 job, said Rob Baccala, vice president of Richard E. Pierson Construction Co. of Woodstown, one of the general contractors for the project.

That will include workers such as carpenters, ironworkers, laborers, and operating engineers, as well as truck drivers and those making asphalt and concrete.

Based on a Federal Highway Administration estimate that 35,000 jobs are supported by every $1.25 billion invested in transportation projects, the I-295 project will create about 1,932 jobs in the broader economy.

Since the work will stretch over three years, much of the hiring won't happen immediately.

"Our work probably won't start until around September," said Joe DeSilvio, project manager for DeSilvio & Co., a Winslow subcontractor responsible for much of the bridge work on the I-295 project. DeSilvio said he expected to employ from 10 to 20 ironworkers, who earn about $35 an hour plus benefits, during the four phases of the job.

"We really need this bad," said Richard Sweeney, business representative and financial secretary for Ironworkers Local 399 in Gloucester County. "Work is really bad now."

Michael Capelli, executive secretary for the New Jersey Regional Council of Carpenters, said the project would provide "desperately needed jobs" for his members and other workers. He said the I-295 project would provide more than 200,000 hours of work for carpenters, the equivalent of about 50 carpenters on the job every workday for two years.

Capelli said the unemployment rate for his union's members in New Jersey is from 15 percent to 20 percent.

Statewide, New Jersey is getting $652 million from the stimulus pot for highways and bridges, $133 million of that to be spent in South Jersey. Southeastern Pennsylvania is getting $258 million for highways and bridges.

The initial projects are now getting under way. The stimulus money was restricted to projects deemed "shovel-ready." In New Jersey, that includes road projects on the Garden State Parkway and the New Jersey Turnpike as well as I-295.

Highway signs sporting the U.S. Department of Transportation's new TIGER acronym (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) have gone up in the work zones to alert motorists that they're in stimulus land.

Wayne Bernard, the New Jersey Department of Transportation project engineer for the I-295 project, said it would take from six to eight weeks to prepare the shoulders to accommodate traffic so that lanes can be shifted while the work progresses.

Much of the work will be done at night, and the Transportation Department will maintain three travel lanes in each direction between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m.

Crews are putting in variable message signs to tell motorists how long they can expect to be stuck in work zones.

The other general contractor for the I-295 project is South State Inc. of Bridgeton, N.J. It and Pierson are supposed to have most of the work done in the southern zone (between Exits 24 and 26) by April 2011 and in the northern zone (between Exits 28 and 32) by May 2012.

The contractors face penalties of up to $10,000 a day for failing to finish on time, Bernard said.