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Highways division outlines paving, utility-repair and unaccepted-road strategies in capital request
Summary
Highways/stormwater staff described a $10 million annual paving ask, a newer utility-paving program that covers curb-to-curb work when utilities tear up roads, sidewalk and downtown streetscape needs, and a new unaccepted-road account to bring roughly 80 long-neglected streets up to standard.
The highways and stormwater presenter (Speaker 5) briefed the planning board on annual paving, resurfacing and related maintenance priorities.
On standard paving, Speaker 5 reiterated the typical annual ask of $10,000,000 and explained a roughly 30% cost increase over the last five years driven by COVID-era supply-chain and fuel-price pressures. "COVID really raised the prices...it went up about 30% in the last 5, 6 years," Speaker 5 said.
Speaker 5 described a utility-paving program that assesses roads where utilities previously opened trenches; the city asks utilities to pay their share and the city paves curb-to-curb to provide a complete repair. He said the program typically covers about 60% of the road cost via utility contributions and allows the city to act in near real time rather than waiting for multiyear delays.
A new unaccepted-road account would allow the city to bring up to standard roughly 80 roads that were never built to full engineering specifications and therefore were never formally accepted by the city; Speaker 5 said the account would enable safety and maintenance work so residents do not remain in a decades-long limbo. The board asked staff to note earmarks and balances (for example, a $1.54 million balance previously discussed for government-center sidewalks) and to add detail on cost escalation and spending timelines.
Board members commended the efforts to move from reactive to proactive maintenance; no votes were taken.
