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QuickTake:
SUB’s perennial Fourth of July party is on hiatus this year because of major construction on the street pedestrians and vehicles use to enter the event. The roadwork on Mill Street is expected to finish in October.
Springfield Utility Board has canceled its annual Light of Liberty celebration and fireworks show for this year due to roadwork on Mill Street, which the community would need to use to access the event, the utility announced.
The Mill Street construction will not have progressed enough by July 4 to ensure pedestrians can safely enter Island Park, where the event is held, according to a post on SUB’s website.
The utility stated it is considering hosting a late-summer event, which would feature live music, food vendors and kids’ activities like the Fourth of July celebration. Fireworks, however, would not be part of that event because of fire risk. If that event happens, it will benefit the utility’s Project SHARE program, which the Fourth of July event has benefited in the past. That program helps Springfield families who need assistance paying past-due utility bills.
A spokesperson for SUB, Meredith Clark, said the utility is working with community partners to offer $5 general admission tickets to the Springfield Drifters game on July 3, which will include a fireworks show.
Clark said the 2025 event would have been the community’s 20th Light of Liberty celebration. The funds SUB had set aside for the event will be reabsorbed into the utility’s general operating budget, she said. The utility plans to hold the event next year.
More about the Mill Street project
The construction on Mill Street between A Street and Centennial Boulevard began last September and is expected to go through October, a city engineer said. Mill Street is currently restricted to one-way northbound traffic between those intersections. The project’s long timeframe is due to the extensiveness of the work.
Mill Street between the two major thoroughfares had deteriorated beyond what could be repaired with maintenance, public works has stated. Because the roadway needed to be reconstructed, city engineers decided to take a big picture look at the infrastructure in the area. This included replacing a wastewater line that was nearing its end of life and installing new stormwater filters, as well as addressing traffic safety concerns in the area.
“We didn’t want to build a new road and then have to go back and dig it up,” said Kristi Krueger, capital engineering manager for the city. “So we wanted to make sure we did everything we could.”
Engineers also wanted to improve safety along Mill Street, which is lined with residences. Many pedestrians walk to bus stops on Centennial Boulevard and Pioneer Parkway via Mill Street. The construction project included installing five crosswalks and seven speed humps (flatter, less aggressive speed bumps).
In addition, engineers developed a bike facility along both sides of Mill Street from Main Street to E Street. Previously, bikes rode in the street. A bike facility differs from a bike lane by separating cyclists from vehicles with a landscape strip, Krueger said. Bike lanes have been installed between E Street and Centennial Boulevard.
“We’re really trying to make this corridor as safe as we can get it,” Krueger said.
The bike facility also will provide safer access to downtown for cyclists using the West D Street Greenway, she said.
According to public works, nine bicyclist-involved crashes were reported along the roadway from 2008-15.