OGDENSBURG — The city has spent more than $30,000 keeping Patterson Street, the crumbling main access road to the port, safe and viable for commercial commerce. On Monday, the City Council will vote to take its first steps toward restoring the problematic street.

The council will vote to apply for funding to rehabilitate the street, which has deteriorated because of the constant heavy traffic from the port. The council also will vote on whether to support the Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority in creating a secondary access road for the port.

The Patterson Street project will cost an estimated $7.8 million and will last an estimated two years, according to the meeting agenda submitted to the council. The project is scheduled to begin in 2012.

In addition to repaving and widening the road, curbs, sidewalks, drainage structures and storm sewer piping will be replaced. Sanitary sewer piping, manholes and water mains will be replaced or rehabilitated if needed. Director of Public Works Kit W. Smith said some of this infrastructure is more than 100 years old.

With the proposed funding the city will pay 5 percent of the total, about $400,000, and the remainder will be paid for by state and federal grants.

The road is a designated a federal corridor, which makes it eligible for a special federal grant .

"There may not be any costs to the city once all avenues are explored," Mr. Smith said, although he acknowledged that was a best-case scenario. "There are a lot of variables and this figure could rise in the next four years."

Related to this issue, the council will vote whether to support the OBPA as it applies for funding to create a secondary access road off Barre Street. The support will be in the form of letters backing the OBPA in its funding applications.

"Together we are trying to make this package happen," Mr. Smith said. "It is critical to keep the port viable."

Although Mr. Smith said Patterson Street will not be inaccessible for the two years of construction, there is "strong concern" for the commercial traffic, and an alternative access to the port would solve this problem.

OBPA Director Wade A. Davis declined to comment about the proposed alternative access, but in June the OBPA acquired a 0.25-acre property across from Barre Street, which overlooks the port.