From the San Angelo Standard-Times, Friday, January 26, 1996.
Frigid weather and delayed deliveries have pushed back the finish date for a street and walkway project at El Paseo de Santa Angela, Project Manager John Dewitt said Thursday.
City and state officials had hoped to finish by Feb. 1.
"When it's real cold, you can't pour cement," Rene Martinez of J.R. Landscaping and Sprinkler Systems of Lubbock said.
Also a hoped-for shipment of colored cement hasn't arrived, meaning wooden frames in the shape of stars in octagons still lie empty on Orient Avenue.
Martinez said the stars will be filled with cement when the colored dye arrives.
In the meantime, landscapers continue to lay brick for a walkway along Orient Avenue.
Despite the delay, former city manager Stephen Brown said he was impressed with the progress of the project.
"I think overall it's been a great success," Brown said.
And DeWitt, who is also district design engineer for the Texas Department of Transportation, predicted J.R. Landscaping will finish within the 45 working days left on the contract.
"I feel that he will be able to finish work in the alloted time," Dewitt said.
Martinez said the project will be done before then, even if it means working at night.
Dewitt said 140 working days (not including weekends and holidays) were allotted for the project.
Every working day after the 45 days are up will take $500 off the payment to the company, Dewitt said.
Brown said the next project, the renovation of the passenger depot into a city transit center and railroad museum, will begin in March or April.
Also construction on a new home for the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts will begin in the next two years.
El Paseo de Santa Angela is nearing completion after four years of planning and developing. In 1992, a Regional-Urban Design Assistance Team surveyed the area around Fort Concho and the old railroad depots in hopes of developing a historical center for San Angelo.
In February 1995, the freight depot was converted into the Santa Fe Crossing Senior Center.
In December, El Paseo was dedicated in a ceremony combined with the Christmas on the Concho lighting display.
