Marion Aldermen are looking to address the condition of one of the town’s busiest roads as they consider a paving or patching effort in the near future.

In a meeting Tuesday, Town Engineer Shaun Miles said an estimated cost to pave and stripe Confederate Drive from Dale Drive to Old Country Club Road East is around $644,000, including roughly $525,000 in asphalt.

“If you just want to use a round even number, it’s about $650,000 to pave and stripe,” he said.

Mayor Larry Gill said paving the entire road may not be feasible but aldermen could look at striping the road — painting the yellow and white lines — which is desperately needed. In a breakdown of the costs provided by Miles, striping is estimated at approximately $25,000.

“It’s not in that bad of shape as far as asphalt, potholes. It’s got some spots you need to hit, but I don’t think it’s where we need to pave the whole road,” he said. “I do think, and my main objective in this was looking at the striping, and I do think it needs to be striped.”

With the current costs of paving, Gill said the town is likely going to have to depend on assistance from the county road department for any paving projects it does. The county’s paving machine, however, has been down for maintenance and repairs eight of the last ten months, he said.

Having fallen behind on its own paving projects, Gill said it may be some time before the county is able to look at paving in Marion.

“They use one paving machine for the whole county, and so we’re probably not very high up on their list at all as it comes to paving,” he said.

As the board considers striping, Alderman Lou Ann Baylor said she has noticed a dark stretch along Confederate Drive near Overstreet Lane, where adding reflectors to the striping could help improve the situation.

Miles, however, said it might be more cost effective to explore adding a new street light. The reflectors, he said, are not cheap.

“Those reflectors are just astronomical. They’re like $100 a piece,” he said.

In other business, Miles said a preconstruction meeting for the town’s sewer rehabilitation project was scheduled for Tuesday after the Board of Aldermen meeting.

Marion’s sewer project involves using cameras to inspect the sewer lines and make repairs where needed. Aldermen in September awarded the project to Video Industrial Services out of Birmingham, Alabama, for $749,975, which included two bid alternates.

Funding for the project is coming from American Rescue Plan Act funds. Marion received $300,000 in ARPA funding and took advantage of a 2-for-1 matching grant from the state to give the town a total of $900,000 to spend on the project.

The town is also preparing to move forward with work on a new freshwater treatment facility on the north side of town. The site has been cleared of trees and underbrush, Miles said, and he recommends moving forward with bids for contractors to drill the well.

The well is one of the biggest aspects of the treatment plant project, Miles said, and it is also the biggest opportunity for things to go wrong.

“If there’s going to be a price overrun, it’s going to be with the well,” he said.