Pottsville officials are gearing up for the annual road program, with a budget of “roughly $100,000” and numerous options on how to spend it, Thomas W. Whitaker, the city’s superintendent of streets, said Monday.
And he visited a few sites most likely to make the list.
“I’m pretty sure these will be done this year, but we’ll be deciding that in June. We have a list, but things get added to the list all the time. Then we prioritize it. That’s the way it goes,” Whitaker said.
They include:
• The pothole-ridden stretch of West Norwegian Street between Second and Third streets.
“We’d like to bring our miller in here and we’ll grind off the uneven surface and apply a hot blacktop. We’d like to do it by August. But the area needs more than resurfacing. There are two collapsed storm drains at Third Street which need to be replaced,” Whitaker said.
• The uneven grooves on North 16th Street between Laurel Boulevard and Elk Avenue near Pottsville Area School District’s campus.
“It’s alligatored,” Whitaker said.
“The last time it was done was maybe 20 years ago. It’s pretty bad. It’s all brittle now. All of the asphalt is gone from salt. It just breaks apart. There’s no binder left in it,” Kerry Ansbach, the school district’s director of facilities and transportation, said Monday.
“If they do that street, it would improve the area around the school. And that road gets used so hard. It’s a high-profile road,” Ansbach said.
• The narrow called Line Alley behind the new CVS Pharmacy which opened April 25.
“The city has a paver which is a smaller paver, very good for alleys and small streets that we can do one pass on. So we’ll just be doing a topcoat,” Whitaker said.
The city’s 2016 road program may also include parts of Mount Hope Avenue between Seventh and 12th streets, and sections of McBarron Street, 13th Street, 14th Street and 15th Street, Whitaker said.
Before assembling the final list of projects, city officials have a few things to consider.
City officials keep track of the problems with the city’s 48 miles of streets using the Urgent Repair List, an inventory that is updated with reports from council members, the street department and citizens.
There are seven wards in the city and Whitaker said he and city officials make an effort to include streets from every ward in the annual road program.
“In just about every ward, you can find some bad streets,” Whitaker said.
Last year, the city earmarked $105,000 for its 2015 street maintenance and improvement program, using $75,000 in state liquid fuels funds and $30,000 from the city’s general fund, City Administrator Thomas A. Palamar said last year. Whitaker anticipated the city would have the same amount at its disposal this year.
On May 9, the city council decided to advertise for bids on two proposals related to this year’s road program.
The bids received by the deadline — 1:30 p.m. June 9 — will also be factors in the city’s decision-making process, Whitaker said.
With one proposal, the city hopes to hire a contractor for “bituminous paving” on a section of Jackson Street, according to bid notice.
“It’s for a complete resurfacing of Jackson Street from East Norwegian Street to Greenwood Avenue. It’s already been resurfaced from Greenwood Avenue down to Mauch Chunk Street. We’re looking for a contractor because of the size of the project, the width, the length and the grade of the hill. We don’t have the kind of equipment to do that,” Whitaker said.
With the other proposal, the city is planning to rent paving equipment, including a Gradall hydraulic excavator, a tack coat vehicle and a paver with an 8-foot to 13-foot paving width.
“These will assist us with our paving,” Whitaker said.
Total, there are 16 full-time workers in the streets department, including Whitaker.
Whitaker said the streets department works to repair potholes all year.
Citizens can report potholes on city streets by calling the city hall at 570-622-1234 or the city garage at 570-622-7690. Or they can go online to the city’s website and click on the link titled “Report A Pothole,” Whitaker said.