OCR Text |
Show City repaves roads .n V ; . , ' ,v- ' I - . V , I $ , i x , )l , V - O '' ' l t n Y s- l :'pi vsv ' ' . 7 ; f . , : pi 4 V- - v m l'i In late winter, Frank and Street Supt. Grant Fowles will look at the roads in the city and analyze which ones have received the most complaints. com-plaints. They try to take care of the main roads first and the smaller ones next. Frank pointed out that the city is trying to get all the roads in the city either overlaid or with mixed rick every 10 years. Some of the streets they will be looking at next winter are in Blackhawk, above 100 North from . 300 E. to 500 East, 1100 North, and others. In about a year work will begin on completely repaving 1100 North from 100 East to the west city limits. Frank mentioned that 500 North is a good example of asphalting, followed by chip and seal. The street is still in good shape after many years. Road people from outside the county have come to see how Pleasant Grove does its streets. There have been oil company representatives, street superintendents superin-tendents and public works people. They have cut samples from the mixed rick and cannot believe they are selling up as hard as they are. Frank said they paid about half of the cost of slag for the pea gravel which they used this year. Other cities are using it now that they have seen Pleasant Grove's. He added that wetting down the gravel before it is laid keeps the dust down and the evaporation of the water causes the oil to be sucked into it. The Public Works Director said that they are trying to do the best job they can with the money they have to spend. They are not having to use their B and C road funds to buy equipment and this allows more to be spent on the streets. He stated that the city council has really helped with this by supplementing the streets fund with other money when necessary. By the end of this week, the repaving on several of the streets where the roads were dug up for the Centeral Utah Project will be completed. Frank urged any citizens who have complaints or comments to call him and he will be happy to talk to them about their concerns. Recent pictures of the William Wadley homes which were knocked down last week. cU Pleasant Grove City recently completed chip sealing or repaving several miles of road in the community com-munity as part of the ongoing plans to refurbish city streets. Public Works Director Frank Mills said that city crews had chip sealed about four and one-half miles of road, did 1.7 miles with mixed rick, and did two miles of two and one-half inch overlays. The chip sealing equipment is owned by Pleasant Grove, American Fork, Lehi, Alpine and Lindon. The five cities go in together to chip seal the roads and do one community after the other until they are all done. Equipment and manpower from each city participates in this cooperative project. In Pleasant Grove, 1,100 tons of gravel and 28,000 gallons of oil were used to chip seal the roads. Because of the current low price of oil, the cost will come in lower than the $20,000 that had been budgeted, according to Mills. This was a good year to do roads because of the lower oil costs and the city council has made sure that enough money is in the road fund for maintenance. Mills explained that mixed rick used to be the way they made roads. It has some advantages and some disadvantages. The best advantage is they end up with thicker roads for less money. They used 1,740 yards of half-inch minus gravel and 35,000 gallons of oil. The gravel and oil are mixed together and placed in a "windrow" in the center of the road. For every foot from the windrow there was four gallons of oil shot into it. This is mixed back and forth until it is put down by blade. Mills noted that on 1800 North, the windrow was put down on Monday and on Tuesday it was shot with oil. On Wednesday they mixed it and laid part of the road. Then they finished it on Thursday. bii re The old William Wadley homes as they appeared during the early days of Pleasant lw Grove. ! k He said that if it rains, the rick has to have the water evaporated out of it. Weather conditions really affect a mixed road. They try not to use the mixed rick on roads with a lot of curb and gutter. Mills praised the rick-type road and explained that they dug up a 26-year-old road on 400 E. Center this summer. As the sun began to work on the broken up asphalt and the oil came out on it, they determined the pavement was still "alive" and it was reworked and used as the sub-base sub-base for the new rick. Rick roads thrive on having traffic on them. Where a rick road meets an overlaid one, it becomes difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins as they blend so nicely into one another. The 15 blocks of mixed rick cost about $24,000. In comparison the 13 blocks of overlay on 300 East cost about $60,000. Of course, the 300 East project was wider. Frank noted that when the city repaves a road they place roadway everywhere that it already been laid. Overlays are all done by the city and a contractor. If all goes right, the city will do about one more mile of overlay near 1100 North and the Mahogany Drive area. This year they have used 6,000 ton of asphalt and about 430 tons of tie-ins. tie-ins. Frank said that there is a good possibility of having almost four miles of new asphalt and mixed road in Pleasant Grove this year. He added that sometimes the citizens are concerned about the city putting down chip seal one year after the asphalt has been laid. He said they do this because of the weather. With the asphalt being quite porous, the freezing and thawing will ruin the road in a short time. Frank noted that the freezing and thawing is what ruins roads and it is not just here in Pleasant Grove, but it is everywhere. Without chiping and sealing a raod would only last about four to five years . One year after a road is paved with an overlay, the chip seal is put down to protect it. It is first shot with oil to seal and then the gravel is placed over the oil for a wearing surface so that tires are not wearing on the asphalt. This year they used washed pea gravel because of the cost and it is not thrown off the tires like slag is. The pea gravel is easier on the tires and the snow plows. It is also easier to stripe than slag. The chip and seal will extend the road's life to eight or ten years. Frank mentioned that it has been three years since the city did 200 South from State St. to 300 East. They have not had to even patch any chuckholes on 200 South in that area. The chip sealing process saves can and manhours on repairing chuckholes. The city crews will try to sweep up the excess chips as soon as posssible and put it on the shoulders of the roads where it is needed. They will use the new water truck and do what is called shouldering. He said they like to stripe the roads a month after laying the road. The paint is absorbed too much if it is done too soon. He noted that they will begin striping the roads at the end of Sept. |