AUBURN – A new staircase connecting Court Street and the city’s RiverWalk should be ready for pedestrians by July 4.

Most of the work building a retaining wall, staircase and walkway behind Gritty McDuff’s is finished, according to Reine Mynahan, the city’s community development administrator.

“But there is some paving and curbing on the project that needs to get finished, plus they want to do the landscaping and plant the grass,” she said.

The project will let pedestrians continue walking along the river without having to detour up Main Street, but it doesn’t go under Court Street. That was part of an earlier plan, but Mynahan said it was too expensive.

“There were some engineering problems that we just didn’t solve,” she said. “It could still happen someday, but not right now.”

The project is paid for by a $161,300 federal Community Development Block Grant. That’s money the city receives to pay for social service agencies, building affordable housing and community amenities such as Festival Plaza and Bonney Park.

The stairway has been in the works since the city completed work on Festival Plaza in 2002.