The proposed auxiliary waterline for the City of Vicksburg cleared another hurdle with the approval of an agreement between the city and Kansas City Southern Railroad allowing the line to cross under the tracks at a spot south of Haining Road’s intersection with North Washington Street.

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen Monday approved the agreement, which requires the city to pay KCS $9,375 for right of way.

KCS’s approval on the crossing was one of three items remaining before the city can advertise the project for bids. As of October, the city was waiting on a right of way on North Washington Street from the county and project approval by the Mississippi Department of Health, which is required by state law to approve waterline projects.

City officials and representatives from Jackson-based IMS Engineers, the project engineers, anticipate advertising the project for bids in the spring.

Public Works Director Garnet Van Norman said the city has received its right of way from the county.

“The county has done everything it has been asked to do,” he said. “All we’re waiting for is the Health Department.”

“I think the Department of Health has asked for more information for clarity,” Mayor George Flaggs Jr. said. “So we’re still on track.”

The 30-inch line will provide emergency water service to the city’s estimated 10,000 customers if something happens to the city’s 36-inch main waterline that runs along Washington Street. The project is estimated at $3.2 million, with $2.45 million of it coming from a grant from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Broken out, the city’s match to finance the work comes to $841,821.

The line will start at the water treatment plant at Haining Road, go south along North Washington Street to a point south of Vicksburg National Cemetery, where it will cross park property to Fort Hill Drive and then to Cherry Street, where it would connect with an existing city line on Jackson Street.

Plans for the auxiliary waterline project began in 2010 after a sudden shift in the soil on Washington Street during construction of the Corps’ Lower Mississippi River Museum and Interpretive Center threatened the main waterline. The line was later relocated.

On November 2010, the Board of Mayor and Aldermen hired IMS to perform the engineering for the project. There had been little action by city officials on the project after IMS’ hiring until November 2013, when Flaggs called a meeting of IMS representatives, city officials, and Corps and National Military Park officials.

Since then, city and park officials and IMS representatives have addressed several issues, including resolving a wetlands problem where the line enters the park through a drainage area for Mint Springs.

In April, city and county officials approved an interlocal agreement that allowed the city to take over the maintenance and repair of Fort Hill Drive, clearing the way to run the line south along Fort Hill to connect with the line on Jackson Street. The agreement was necessary because the street is a county road that was deeded to the county by the National Park Service in 1936.