Your civic association has just been notified by Arlington County that maintenance work will take place on the steps connecting Nash street near Turnberry Tower to Colonial Terrace at the east side of the Highgate community.

We just received word from Mr. Dave Hundelt, Chief Operating Engineer, Water/Sewer/Streets Bureau, Dept of Environmental Services, with the schedule and plan for maintenance and repairs. Here are the details:

...work will commence next week and will include minor concrete repairs and some creation of scuppers or channels for some of the currently trapped water to flow out or down the stairs. We’ll be doing that between the handrail and the side coping walls so as to avoid any tripping hazard within the regular pathway. There are a few areas that just hold a little bit of water, and short of replacing entire landing areas, we’ll try to remove the puddles with these channels.

Other minor concrete work will address failing repairs from the Turnberry work and other areas of concrete deterioration. These will be small areas where we’ll remove a few inches of the concrete and replace it with either concrete or epoxy patching material depending upon the depth and extent of the repairs necessary, so there will be a few areas that will appear patched.

We will also work on the handrails by filling the cups at the base of the poles with additional caulking material, and then clean and re-paint the handrails. The whole surface will get some pressure washing as well, and we’ll see how the coating applied by Turnberry holds up, then decide whether or not to re-apply such a coating perhaps next Spring. It is atypical and not desirable generally to have such a painted staircase, but we’ll maintain what we have at this point. If it is to be re-painted, we’ll likely go with a more neutral stone or off white color.

As I mentioned, work will start next week [week of October 7, 2013] , and we anticipate about 2 or 3 weeks of a small team working on and off depending on the needs of their team on other projects this month and some scheduled training. Later in the month, a larger team may be used for a few days.

Work should be able to be done for most of these areas without having to close the stairs entirely. We may route everyone to one side or the other for flights of the stairs as we’re working in particular areas, but for the most part, the stairs should remain open throughout. There could be brief exceptions, but that’s going to be the goal, and I’m pretty sure during peak commuting times we should be able to keep access open.