A grant-funded High Street wall stabilization project in Jim Thorpe will cost just under $500,000, Jim Thorpe Borough officials announced during a workshop meeting last week.

While it won’t officially award the bid until Thursday, council said Axis Stabilization, a construction group who did similar work on another portion of the wall seven years ago, was the low bidder.

“Axis is familiar with the area because they did the other project so we’re glad to see they’ll be doing it this time around as well,” Council President Greg Strubinger said. “We’ve had success with them and this is a very unique project so knowing the experience they have makes you a little calmer about things.”

Jim Thorpe will be paying for the work with money it received from the Commonwealth Financing Agency Multimodal Transportation Fund.

Clint Davis from Entech Engineering outlined the construction process in February.

The current wall, which poses safety concerns due to its declining condition, will be replaced with a soil nail wall.

“We’re looking to put a soil nail wall, which is drilling a nail in the front of that existing wall at a 45-degree angle until we hit bedrock,” Davis said. “After that, there’ll be a rebar installed and grouted, and after that, there’ll be a wire mesh that goes over that existing wall.”

Davis said the wall’s visual aesthetics would remain the same.

“There will be a form liner on the upper portion of the wall to represent stone,” he added. “The side facing the house on the lower side would be just shotcrete so it’s going to be rough and rugged.”

Axis repaired around 200-feet of the wall in 2017 through a pinning process. They bid $307,365 for that job, which the council took out a Mauch Chunk Trust Company loan to help fund.

This time around, Axis was one of only two bidders for the stabilization work.

“We’re looking at construction to begin on May 29 and end on Sept. 30,” Davis said of the timeline.