D Street underpass project hits 'rocky' patch

The view Thursday from the top of the big hole at D Street and Yellowstone Avenue

Anyone who has driven on North Yellowstone Avenue since Wednesday has most likely noticed the big pile of rocks in the hole where the D Street Underpass used to be.

Crews blasted into 10 feet of basalt at 2 p.m. Wednesday to clear away space for the new bridge's footings, said Kelly Kofoed of Cannnon Builders, the city of Idaho Falls' contractor on the project.

The stones will be hauled away to a Landon Excavating pit. The tree immediately south of the stone tower is also slated to be removed next week. The city wanted to save the tree, but the excavation around the tower, which is actually a pump station dating back to around 1910, damaged too much of its root system, Kofoed said.

Building a bridge is a lot different than building a house or office building. "It's kind of like building a house around your wife while she's making dinner," Kofoed said. Cannon has also been the contractor on the John Adams Parkway bridge over the Idaho Canal, due to be finished in  July. "We had to go deep for the footings at the same time we had traffic going over it every day," he said. In the D Street project's case, train traffic had to be re-routed with a "shoefly," a four-month undertaking by itself. The new underpass is scheduled to open sometime in 2014.

The D Street excavation has yielded all sorts of interesting things: masonry foundations from buildings that made up the Oregon Short Line Railroad depot, which was torn down in 1964, and old tools that had been discarded by railroad workers decades ago.

Kofoed said he and his crew were the first people since the '60s to set foot inside the pump station. There was a hardwood floor that had rotted and a lot of sludgy water in the foundation, which goes down 30 feet. "I'm sure the old pumping equipment is in there," he said.

C&S Auto Repair looking to expand staff

Inside the garage at C&S Auto Repair

C&S Auto Repair (where I have been taking my cars since 2009) is looking for a three or four mechanics motivated to put in long hours and learn new skills.

"I've got the work; I need the manpower, people who know their stuff," said Shana Poulsen, who owns the business with Chris Neal, who heads the current team of five mechanics. "What they need to understand that this is flat rate. The harder they work, the more money they are going to make."

Neal and Poulsen moved in September 2012 to their current location, 2435 E. Iona Road. With 9,834 square feet, the new shop has more than twice the space they had on Ammon Road, and positioned within sight of the roundabout at Hitt and Iona Roads.

They're about to get OE-specific scanners for Chrysler, Ford and GM vehicles. Neal's specialty all along has been GM electronics, and they rebuild instrument clusters for $150. "It's been kind of a hot area for us," Poulsen said

For more information, call (208) 524-2770 or visit their Web site at www.candsautorepairllc.com.

Chamber After Hours at Bill's Bike Shop's new location

The Greater Idaho Falls Chamber of Commerce Business After Hours this week will be held Thursday at the new Bill's Bike Shop, 930 Pier View Drive, from 5 to 7 p.m.

It will be catered by Stockman's Restaurant. There will be ample opportunities to network, and drawings for prizes. Members and non-members are invited to attend.

For more information, call 523-1010.

Virtual tour Friday aimed at helping public understand Alzheimer's, dementia

Anyone who hasn't had first-hand experience with Alzheimer's disease or dementia might not realize its brutal impact on patients and caregivers alike. On Friday, however, anyone interested in gaining a greater understanding is invited to take part in a sensitivity training session offered by the cloudnine Agency in Idaho Falls and the Esplin & Packer Eldercare Law Firm in Blackfoot.

The session will feature the internationally known Virtual Dementia Tour®, a scientifically proven method of building a greater understanding of dementia through the use of sensory tools and instruction.

Reservations for the tour are suggested, as space is limited. The tour takes approximately 25 minutes. Contact Jodi Davis, Esplin & Packer Law at 785-5600 or Julia Barr with The cloudnine Agency at 552-0399, to reserve your spot, or email: jodidavisecc@hotmail.com or julia@idahocloudnine.com.

The session and tours will take place at Liberty Square Luxury Senior Apartments, 2475 South Ammon Road, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The Virtual Dementia Tour® is an immersion simulation of dementia created to teach people about the physical and mental challenges facing those living with it. For caregivers, it helps them provide better care by offering hope and providing tips and tools necessary to create an environment that supports the needs of those with the disease.

More than 500,000 people from elder care communities, corporations, caregivers, first responders, healthcare providers, municipal employees and nonprofit organizations in 14 countries have experienced the tour. Of those, 94 percent said they felt it was crucial and necessary to undergo the training in order to provide good care to those with dementia.

To learn more about the Alzheimer's Association, visit this link: https://thelongestday.alz.org/.

Natural Grocers schedules Nov. 12 opening for Idaho Falls store

The old Andrew Well Drilling building on 17th Street is gone, and the ground is being prepared for a 15,000-square-foot Natural Grocers store.

Dirt is finally being moved on the site where Andrew Well Drilling used to be, to make room for Natural Grocers, a 58-year-old chain based in Colorado. The 15,000-square-foot store is slated to open Nov. 12, said Nancy Flynn, spokeswoman for the company.

In addition to the store, the developer, Leadership Circle, LLC, of Montrose, Colo., is seeking eventually to build a restaurant and a retail store on the 4.42 acres, but the only definite plans at the moment are for the grocery. The 4,816 square-foot-restaurant pad and 11,250-square-foot retail pad are listed with Randy Waters of Sperry Van Ness High Desert.

Natural Grocers has 68 stores in 12 states, with six more scheduled to open this year. In 2011 it opened stores in Boise and Missoula, and most recently it opened a store in Helena, in December.

"We really cater to specialty diets, gluten-free, non GMO (genetically modified organisms)," Flynn said. Because of their small footprint (a Whole Foods store, by contrast, is typically twice the size) and their emphasis on personal communication and education rather than advertising, they are able to keep their costs down. "We feel like we're the label-readers in the market," Flynn said.

When it opens, the store will employ around 25 people. All the produce they sell is USDA-certified organic, and Flynn said they buy local produce "every chance we get.

Here is a link to its Web site: http://www.naturalgrocers.com/, and there is a link on the site for anyone who has organic crops to sell.