Photo by Deb Gau Work crews prepared parts of West Lyon Street for striping on Tuesday morning. West Lyon Street and North Third Street in Marshall’s downtown are now both open to through traffic, although city Public Works Director Jason Anderson said some striping and landscaping work will still continue.

MARSHALL — The traffic barriers around part of Marshall’s downtown came down Tuesday morning. While there’s still road striping and other tasks left to complete, the newly-reconstructed West Lyon Street is now open to traffic, said Marshall Public Works Director Jason Anderson.

The project to update utilities and roads on part of North Third Street and West Lyon Street made good progress this summer, Anderson said. The streets were completed “pretty close” to when city staff expected they would be open, he said.

“We had a really good construction season, with minimal weather delays,” Anderson said. “I think all of our (city) projects have wrapped up in a decent timeline.”

“The downtown project area is open to through traffic at this point,” Anderson said Tuesday. However, he said drivers should watch for possible interruptions as striping and landscaping work continues. On Tuesday, parking areas along West Lyon Street were blocked off with traffic cones while work crews ground out striping areas in the concrete for street lanes and parking spaces.

Utility and street reconstruction work has been going on parts of Third Street and West Lyon Street all summer. The project included new water and sewer lines, concrete streets, and sidewalk updates on a total of five blocks downtown. Work on part of North Third Street started in April, and then continued with portions of Lyon Street, starting near the intersection with East College Drive and gradually moving toward Fifth Street.

In March, the city accepted a bid of about $3.84 million for the project.

“We’re really excited to have the utility work done this summer,” Anderson said. The surface of West Lyon Street had also been in serious need of updates.

The downtown project also included sidewalk updates meant to improve pedestrian access downtown. One major change was making a block of North Third Street a one-way street. Other changes were geared toward making a little more space for drivers on Lyon Street, Anderson said. Instead of having angle parking on both sides of Lyon Street, there will now be parallel parking on one side of the street, and angle parking on the other side.

Anderson said one part of the downtown project — reconstructing the Addison parking lot across from the Marshall 6 movie theater — hasn’t been addressed yet. The parking lot work will be completed next year. In addition to making a better surface in the parking lot, the reconstruction would also line up traffic flow with new entrances and exits built as part of the downtown project, he said. In the meantime, Anderson encouraged drivers to be patient.