At Monday’s City Council Finance Committee, city officials revealed the list of streets it hopes to repair and improve as part of this year’s street paving program.
The city intends to pave all or portions of Eagle Court, Sorensen Drive, Brookstone Drive, Monteclair Court, Springwood Lane, Creekview Drive, Palm Drive, Milridge Drive, Millington Way, Damos Way, Tarragon Drive, North Walnut Street, East Fourth Street and an alley between Main and Plum streets known as Alley E. Additionally the city intends to improve a portion of West Third Street, but that project will be paid for not from the city’s infrastructure capital improvement fund but as part of a larger water line replacement project.
In total officials are hoping to pave 2.78 miles of city streets, about 2.74% of the city’s street total.
The city has budgeted $1.3 million for this year’s pavement maintenance program.
City officials have said the goal is to allocate at least $1.5 million a year for paving, with the intent to be to repave about 4% of city streets each year. Typically $1.5 million will do that. Officials have said that if a street is built to last about 25 years, the city needs to replace about 4% of streets, about 4 miles, each year to stay on a maintenance schedule. Last year city council opted to add money earned off the sale of property in the city’s Innovation Park to the paving program mid-year.
Hoyng said that in the next week or so, the city will put the program out for bid. He said the plan is to tackle all 15 streets, but that will depend on the bids.
“We can always open bids and see how they come in,” Hoyng said. “We can always take a street or project off.”
Committee members asked about adding funds this year to the capital improvement budget. Finance Director Brad Lutz said he wouldn’t be “comfortable adding anything to the capital budget.”
He said revenue looks “good, not great.”
“I think caution is important,” Lutz said.
Committee member Zach Bordner asked about how streets are selected for the program. He asked about a system of priorities.
Hoyng explained that the city hires an outside firm to drive and scan the streets and create a Pavement Condition Rating (PCR) for each street. Those streets with the lowest PCR get the highest priority. He said streets with more traffic also get higher priority. Hoyng said officials look at the PCR, the traffic and the cost to repair each street to determine which streets will be included in the program each year.
In addition to the $1.3 million for the annual paving program, the city has allocated $1.3 million to continue making improvements on Route 31, this year from the intersection with Elwood Avenue to the bridge over U.S. 33. This year’s improvements on Route 31 are the final phase of a three-year project on the road.
Committee and council member Henk Berbee said that with the Route 31, the city will repave about 3.3% of the city streets.
Berbee said he would like to see more streets being paved each year, “but unfortunately we can only work with the amount of money you have.”
Hoyng said that on Monday the city accepted a bid for the Route 31 work. The engineer’s estimate for this phase was $3.96 million. The lowest and best bid, which was accepted, came in at $3.998 million. Hoyng said the budget for the project also needed to include an additional 5%, about $200,000, for overages.
Hoyng said overages happen with “every project, every town, every city.”
“The contractor is going to find things that were missed,” Hoyng said.
Bordner expressed concern that the bid came in higher than the engineer’s estimate. He asked if there was a way to negotiate with the contractor or to ask other contractors to bid.
“There is no negotiating,” Hoyng said.
The engineer explained that under state law, project bids have to be done a specific way and the city has to choose the lowest and best bid to prevent favoritism or fraud. Hoyng said that while the engineer creates an estimate, “but you don’t know ‘til you open bids.”
He said engineers could estimate high, but that doesn’t help budget.
Committee and council member Mark Reams said he was impressed that the estimate was within 1%.
Hoyng said there are some things that could be removed from the project, but the major expenses cannot be removed. He added that because the project has received large grants, there are certain things that need be included.
Bordner asked about chip sealing rather than repaving.
Hoyng said that is not something that has been done in the past, but emphasized, “we are looking at more preventative maintenance.”