Roads to run red in future budgets

THUNDER BAY – If the city’s roads division meets all of its objectives in 2017, it will fall $440,000 short on its budget. Meeting its own standards through 2018 will run the department another $480,000 in the red.

Roads manager Brad Adams presented the Roads Maintenance Objectives report to City Council on Monday, outlining changes his department aims to make to its standards.

The report identifies the measurements of road cracks and potholes that will identify them as maintenance priorities as well as standards for bridges, culverts, ditches and gravel surfaces.  

“Some of the objectives are basically for inspections to be aware of what’s going on during weather events, to make sure infrastructure is functioning properly and to also to enhance services when it comes to asphalt services,” Adams said. 

A city survey found 85 per cent of the 627 respondents interviewed felt the city ought to enhance its efforts to repair and upkeep asphalt roads.

“They indicated that pothole patching or just rehabbing streets is an issue,” Adams said.

Beyond asphalt surfaces, the majority of those surveyed expressed the city should continue its upkeep commitment on almost all other road services. Fifty-six per cent of residents felt satisfied with the level of residential snow removal. When it came to ditches and culverts, 79 and 80 per cent of respondents respectively agreed the city was allocating the proper resources to upkeep.

The public also dismissed every new service idea the survey presented, with the exception of a narrow 48 to 44 per cent approval rate for curb and gutter maintenance. New service options included an 82 per cent disapproval rate for winter bike lane maintenance and a 56 per cent disapproval of a proposal that would have supported driveway snow removal.

Council received the report for information only and no vote was required.