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Public Works lays out five-year resurfacing plan; department asks board to consider increased funding
Summary
Public Works presented a five-year resurfacing plan covering about 20% of Manchester's roads, detailed condition-assessment methodology and said $12 million per year would begin to close a backlog created by inflation and flat funding; aldermen probed ward equity, materials and staffing constraints.
Deputy Public Works Director Owen Frangray and Chief Highway Engineer Caleb Dobbins presented the city's roadway resurfacing program, describing how pavement-condition indices, traffic volume and utility coordination shape a five-year resurfacing plan.
Dobbins told the Board the city has roughly 413 center-line miles and the department uses a consultant vehicle that drives the network every three years to gather PCI (pavement condition index) data. He said typical treatment options include crack sealing, microsurfacing (a thin protective layer), milling with overlay and full-depth reclamation in the worst conditions.
"We do this about on a 3 year basis," Dobbins said of condition surveys, adding the approach measures ride quality, cracking and rutting and allows staff to prioritize high-volume corridors before lower-volume residential streets.
The presentation noted a recent three-year paving inflation of roughly 33% for asphalt and recommended funding on the order of $12 million per year to address roughly 20% of the roadways over five years; Dobbins said a sustained $9'$10 million a year would keep the system at steady state while $12 million annually would reclaim lost ground.
Aldermen asked whether concrete or other materials were viable alternatives, how ward-level priorities were derived and how the department coordinates with utilities. Dobbins said concrete may have longer life in some climates but performs poorly in New Hampshire's freeze-thaw cycles; he described monthly coordination meetings with utilities and said maps provided to aldermen show ward-specific condition grades derived after the consultant analysis.
On staffing, presenters said internal crew shortages (notably truck drivers and operators) modestly reduced paving capacity but that city personnel still provide good value by handling some short-term fixes rather than outsourcing all preservation work.
The presentation concluded with committee acceptance of recommended bond resolutions tied to specific CIP items and a pledge from Public Works to provide ward-level detail on road sections categorized as "failed" or "below poor."
