A construction project on Fellows Street means 31 homes will be destroyed. And the city says they have to do it. The houses on the west side of the street will be acquired by the city and then demolished. That's in response to the state's plan of making Fellows Street south of Ireland accessible to the new 31-Highway. Home owners are not happy with it.
"Betty and I have, especially Betty cause I was on the road all of my life, have put this house together, piece by piece, and this amounts to a persons whole life," John Martz said. "Half of her life is in this house, and her and I are not very happy with what's going on."
Another neighbor, Adam Detwiler, has spent just three years on the block. His house over looks hole 15 on Erskine Golf Course. He says this project blind sided him.
"Thirty-one homes. That's 31 families. And if you're going to affect that many lives, let us know about it. Let us say something about it. If you want to go on after that, at least we've had the satisfaction of saying our peace. It depresses me, I come out here every morning and I look at my unfinished deck, I want this to be over with. If they're going to do it, let them do it. I want to be out of here." Detwiler said.
On the other side of the equation, Bill Shalliol, a business developer for the City of South Bend, says this work has to be done.
"We're dealing with 70 some property owners you know, so then you've doubled the cost, you've doubled the impact on lives. so it's not something we've taken lightly so we're trying to do it right and do it once." Shalliol said.
Shalliol says the 31-Highway project will bring 8,00 cars a day to Fellows street. They say they needed a turn lane, wider through lanes and a 10-foot bike path. It'll also create a new intersection where Fellows will turn into Chippewa, creating one road back out to Michigan street.
Shalliol says the city has an aggressive plan to complete the project. The home owners will be appraised by two separate companies and then offered the average price of the two appraisals for their property. The plan for construction to start is the beginning of Spring 2013. With hopes of completing the project by the Summer of that same year.
