OBSERVER Photo by Jimmy McCarthy Rebecca Yanus, city development director, updates the Economic Development Committee on the Central Connection project and the Pier Improvements project. Also pictured are Councilman-at-large Andy Woloszyn, Third Ward Councilman Shaun Heenan, Hector Rosas, festivals/special events coordinator, and Matt Bourke, community development planner.

Two projects with goals to beautify and attract more visitors to the city of Dunkirk are pushing forward.

This past week, Planning and Development Director Rebecca Yanus updated the Economic Development Committee on the Central Connection project and the pier improvements project. Funds for both projects were awarded last year through Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Buffalo Billion 2, and specifically from the New York Smart Growth Community Fund.

The Central Connection project focuses investment along Central Avenue — the three-mile corridor connecting the city, the village of Fredonia and the State University of New York at Fredonia. Yanus said branding and marketing consultants are set to go over key messages that came out of surveys conducted with businesses, the student population and area residents. Yanus said the consultants received a good response.

This upcoming week, Yanus said they’ll go over the messages and begin creating a brand for downtown and the waterfront.

Yanus said they recently met with Barton and Loguidice, architects and engineers on the project, to go over 30 percent of the design plans for Central Avenue, which include bike lanes and intersection improvements within the city and village.

“They hired surveyors to go out and do a survey of Central Avenue and the pier,” she said. “They’re getting the results back within the next couple weeks and that will let them move forward in the design so they can start going further into design.”

As for paving the city side of Central Avenue, Yanus said they’ll be meeting with the county in the weeks to come to the bid the project as one. That way, mill and overlay work and intersection improvements can be scheduled at the same time.

The project will go out to bid this summer with construction anticipated sometime in August. If construction begins then, Yanus said it should be complete by October.

The pier improvements project is currently in the conceptual design phase as Yanus said the architects for the project gave the city three different concepts to examine. Yanus said the city is aiming to gather feedback from the public May 16 at the high school on design concepts.

Mayor Willie Rosas told the committee they’ll do the best job they can to beautify the pier and make as many people happy.

“The key is to get input from as many citizens as possible,” he said.

A concept plan and design could be done by May. The project will then transition to engineering design this summer. Yanus said the project is scheduled for construction sometime in spring 2019.