MnDOT and City of Moorhead engineering staffers introduced plans for the 11th Street double underpass to dozens of members of the community Oct. 17 at an open house at the Hjemkomst Center. (Photos/Nancy Hanson.)Nancy Edmonds Hanson

“It will be great for all of us when it’s done. But in the meantime ….”
Like so many of his Moorhead neighbors, city engineer Bob Zimmerman is confident that the 11th Street double underpass beneath the railroad tracks will be the best thing that’s happened to his city in decades. “You know, generally speaking, people seem to be very happy that it’s finally going to get done,” he says of the project that’s been talked about since he was named to his present job in 1989.
“Of course, nobody likes the disruption during construction, and you can bet there will be plenty of it. The next three years will certainly be somewhat painful. You can’t avoid it.
“But when it’s complete, it’s going to solve so many problems.”
Construction is slated to being on the 800-foot passage between Main and First avenues when the weather cooperates in the spring. Completion of the major downtown project, roughly estimated to cost $117 million, is projected for the fall of 2026. It is being funded by major appropriations by the Minnesota Legislature, as well as federal grant money.
Residents along Second Avenue North and part of 12th Street, outside the immediate underpass zone, have already felt some of the pain to which the engineer refers. Neighborhood roads have been torn up all summer as city crews replaced the water main and sewer lines as the first visible phase of the underpass project, and then resurfaced the roadways.
That’s just a prelude, though, to the coming 36 months of detours, dirt and displacements that lie ahead as the Minnesota Department of Transportation shepherds its largest outstate project to the long-awaited promised land – a new era without five hours of backed-up traffic a day as cars queue up behind crossing arms to wait out 70 trains a day.
Detours will for a time become a way of life as vehicles head north or south on busy 11th Street. Strategic routing will be even more essential for the city’s first responders. While Police Chief Shannon Monroe is confident his officers will figure out alternate routes through the shifting construction zone from the Law Enforcement Center on 11th Street North, Fire Chief Jeff Wallin’s crews face more concrete problems.
The main fire station is half a block east of where the northernmost underpass will dip beneath the first of the new railroad bridges. The avenue is designed to begin its slope downward right in front of the station’s three south-facing bay doors. When long, heavy firetrucks take off from the station as they do now, their front and back ends would scrape the steep grade.
“They can’t make the grade exiting to the south,” Wallin explains. Instead, the fire station must be remodeled to permit them to exit from the opposite side. “We’re going to have to add a third bay on the north side of the station,” he explains. “But when we open up that bay we’ll lose the space we’re using now for storage, mechanical and maintenance equipment.” The solution: building an addition to hold them.
Having firetrucks leaving from the north side of the station means its 50-year-old parking lot, too, must be redesigned. “Those driveways weren’t made for fire trucks back then, and they’re even bigger now,” he says, “so we need to provide wider access.” The redesign is being coordinating with the city’s work on Second Avenue from 12th down to the river. New storm water drains have been installed along that route to transport the rain and ground water pumped from the underpass excavation site.
Though the mammoth construction project will complicate their options for a time, Wallin and his firefighters welcome the eventual prospect of heading south without battling trains. “The underpass will allow a much more rapid response,” he points out. “Now, when the tracks are blocked, we have the choice of either driving down to Third Street along the river or over to the 20-21st Street underpass, almost 10 blocks in either direction.” (During flood periods when Third Street has been swamped, trucks have been forced to cross the First Avenue bridge into Fargo, then come back to Moorhead at Main Avenue.)
“You can never predict when the next train will be coming,” Wallin goes on. “Now, the first thing our drivers do on a call is head straight to 11th Street to get across the tracks. They can’t get caught there when they’re on a call. The worst thing would be to get boxed in at the railroad gates with vehicles lined up behind them.”
When major fire calls require personnel from both the main and south-side stations, train delays can hold up the arrival of much-needed reinforcements … sometimes affecting the initial tactics in putting down the blaze. “For their entire shifts – all day, all night – our crews are always aware of trains.”
The police chief notes that his officers, who drive smaller, more maneuverable vehicles, face fewer obstacles than lumbering firetrucks. Nevertheless, his department is looking forward to having a fast direct route south from the Law Enforcement Center.
“When I first started with the department, it was part of our training to keep somebody on both sides of the railroad tracks,” Monroe remembers. “Trains could delay our response to an incident by as much as 15 minutes.” That was before the 20-21st Street underpass, when trains routinely came all the way into Moorhead, then slowly back up to the BNSF yard in Dilworth.
Coping with construction, of course, is nothing new in the north country. As natives love to say, Minnesota has four seasons – fall, winter, spring and construction. But it seems especially frustrating now at the tail end of what seems like an exceptionally long season.
Pointing to Moorhead’s months-long brick sewer relining project, soon to be completed throughout downtown, the chief observes, “One day you can get through, the next you can’t. You have to be flexible. Like they always do, our officers will adapt as we go along.
“And 11th Street is going to be really great when it’s done.”