The Casper City Council approved $600,000 for a pedestrian underpass at Tuesday's meeting.

The tunnel under Beverly Street, which is currently buried, is Casper's contribution to the nationwide "rails to trails" network.

The trail sits atop old rail beds and runs from downtown near the Natrona County Library north east out to Beverly Street underpass, just south of Yellowstone Highway.

The tunnel was installed in 2006 and buried because the city didn't have enough money at the time to fund the rest of the project.

The project approved Tuesday extends the trial from Lennox Street, which is one block west of Beverly, to the underpass.

City Manager Tom Forslund told council members that with eight companies bidding, bids were low enough that the city would have money left over to extend the path out to Eastdale Park. The low bid was $300,000 less than the $850,000 the city budgeted for the project, and the city set aside another $50,000 contingency fund to the project.

The council would have to approve a separate project that would begin after the underpass is completed.

City Engineer Andrew Beamer said he expects the additional work to cost about $150,000, which would bring the total price for the Lennox-to-Eastdale additions to less than what the city budgeted for just the first portion of the project.

You can reach city reporter Pete Nickeas at pete.nickeas@trib.com or (307) 266-0639. You can read more about Casper politics and government at http://tribtown.trib.com/redtape