BRICK – The township has 256 miles of paved roads, and with limited funds for roadway repair, how do officials choose which project gets done?
Part of Township Engineer Elissa Commins’s job is to prioritize the streets in need of improvement and make her recommendations to the governing body.
She said it is important to point out that there are road repairs and there is road resurfacing. “They are two different ways of maintaining the infrastructure,” she said. “Once a road is resurfaced, it hopefully will not need repair for years to come.”
Road paving is considered to be a ten-year improvement; however, a well maintained road can last for decades, she said.
Pothole filling, crack sealing and other maintenance activities are completed by the township’s Department of Public Works (DPW). Roads that require complete resurfacing and repaving are funded through the annual capital improvement program, Commins said.
When roads need complete reconstruction, which includes base repair, utility upgrades, drainage and surface paving, the cost could reach up to $1.5 million a mile.
An overlay, or surface paving with two inches of asphalt, is more economical and can cost as much as $375,000 a mile.
The engineering department creates a list of roads in need of improvement through a conglomerate of complaints from residents to the mayor, engineering or DPW; complaints from township personnel who drive through the town routinely – such as police, sanitation workers, inspectors and others; and when roadway restoration is needed after the installation of drainage or other roadway excavation, she said.
“I have also reached out to the post offices for input from the postal delivery drivers as they drive the same routes routinely and I feel that they could provide some valuable input with respect to areas where the roadway conditions are really poor,” Commins said.
One she has compiled a list, which usually contains about 100 areas, she visits the roads and groups them into imminent, very bad and can wait, she said.
Due to budgetary constraints – the annual budget for road resurfacing is between $2-$4 million – only the imminent and very bad roads make it onto the recommendation list.
“I prioritize those,” she said. “Then, I ask one of our consulting engineers and between two to four different roadway inspectors to independently investigate them and prioritize them,” she said.
Afterwards, the group reviews and compares their ratings and categorizes them into a “worst is first” basis. The list is put into the capital recommendation report, but there is typically only enough funding to address the first three to 10 projects, depending on the size of the project and the money available, the engineer said.
“It is a very big responsibility and I struggle with it every year,” Commins said. “The projects at the top of the list typically receive funding for design in one capital budget.”
(It is most common for roads to receive design funding in one year’s capital budget and construction funding in the following year’s budget).
Once a paving project is funded for design, survey data is collected, the storm drainage system is evaluated and letters are sent to the underground utility companies to inquire if they have any construction plans in the vicinity.
When a design progresses to about 75 percent, it is recommended for construction funding, she said.
“Sometimes this is swift, other times, our preliminary design work reveals that extensive drainage work or utility work needs to be completed first, which can cause delay,” she said.
Roadway repairs take place all year long, but for paving and road resurfacing, the temperatures should be about 50 degrees, Commins said.
