Douglas County is about ready to accept bids for repairing the Kansas River bridge at Lecompton.

Advertising for bids will begin next Monday and bids will be opened on Jan. 23.

The county’s repair contract calls for a construction start date of March 12. The bridge will be closed to all traffic when repairs begin. The contract sets a “substantial completion” date for Aug. 10, which would be before the start of school in the Perry-Lecompton School District. The contract requires that enough of the repairs be finished by then for the bridge to be reopened. There would be a $10,000 fee assessed against the contractor for each day the bridge isn’t finished after the deadline.

The latest estimates put construction costs between $1.7 million to $2 million, not including repainting the existing steel on the bridge superstructure.

County Engineer Keith Browning said that after the bids are let an attempt will be made to negotiate incentives with a contractor to finish the bridge sooner than Aug. 10.