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When it comes to managing the public works
budget, it’s all a balancing act,” explains Majed Al-Ghafry, public
works director/city engineer for Lemon Grove, a California community of
26,000 people near San Diego. That balancing act recently caused the
city to shift the majority of its street rehabilitation and repair work
from private contractors to the Public Works Department.
Despite the city’s benign climate — the city
motto is “The Best Climate on Earth” — an infrastructure report
commissioned by the city several years ago showed more than 70% of the
streets were degraded. Lemon Grove’s public works budget has to cover
sewer cleaning, parks, tree-trimming, and weed control in addition to
streets, and it just couldn’t keep up. “One contracted project would eat
up the entire year’s budget for street repair,” Al-Ghafry says. “We
simply could not get ahead,”.
Thomas Bell, a 22-year public works department
veteran who worked his way up from maintenance to superintendent, echoes
Al-Ghafry’s frustration. “By the time we would get a project scheduled
through a bid-letting, another crisis would present itself,” Bell
recalls. “Negotiating and change orders were a tedious process that was
not doing anything for our streets. The 14 of us that staff the
department collectively realized we were not in control of our
community’s infrastructure.”
Based on his experience and observations of
other communities, Al-Ghafry knew there were savings available by moving
some contracted functions in-house. “I did my research and realized this
was a great opportunity,” says Al-Ghafry. “I knew the city could provide
the tools, but first I had to ask the staff, ‘Are you in or out?’ I
wasn’t going to push it down their throats.”
After getting the blessing from city manager
Graham Mitchell, it turned out to be a very easy sell to get the City
Council and the public works staff on board, according to Al-Ghafry.
“The reaction from the public works crew was phenomenal,” he recalls.
“They were very gung-ho.”
Before shopping for equipment, city management
decided to test the staff’s paving aptitude. “We used a tow-behind paver
that was old, but it gave us a taste of what paving was about,” Bell
says.
The City went on a shopping spree in August 2005
and picked up an Ingersoll-Rand 3120 self-propelled paver, an asphalt
roller, and a Cimline Magma 110DHC melter/applicator for cracksealing.
Vendor training was combined with a few days working with the Riverside
County paving crew. “We were basically a start-up company as far as our
skills,” Bell notes.
Al-Ghafry fervently believes that if you want
people to excel, then you give them the tools they need to succeed. So
six of the staff who specialize in streets rehabilitation attended the
APWA Show in Minneapolis and Pavement Expo West in Las Vegas to learn as
much about paving as possible. “It’s hard to put a value on this
investment, but it was a tremendous vote of confidence in the staff,”
Bell says.
By late September 2005, Lemon Grove was in the
paving business. After a fair amount of head-scratching, a few
paved-over manholes, and several long days when daylight faded before
the work was done, the crew is about “80% efficient,” according to Bell.
Training on the cracksealer went faster. “It’s
very easy to operate and we have assigned three people to work with it,”
says Bell. “Safety was our primary focus when choosing the melter. It’s
low profile for visibility and easy to operate and maintain thanks to
the external pump that feeds the wand.”
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The Cimline 110-gallon unit is also equipped
with a compressor to blow-out the cracks prior to sealing. This allows
crews to keep a steady pace — one man blowing out the cracks, the other
man sealing. Al-Ghafry claims the return on investment in cracksealing
is excellent because it extends pavement life and efficiently performs
preventative maintenance. Bell agrees, adding, “In order to avoid crisis
situations with roadways and move towards a workable prevention plan,
cracksealing is the key.”
Prime time cracksealing will be between the
months of April and September. Sections of roadway that were cracksealed
last Fall are holding up well, according to Bell.
Paving progress has improved and the city’s
in-house operation has quadrupled the amount of street replacement that
would have been contracted in the same time span. With 335,000 square
feet to be completed in the fiscal year to qualify for California Block
Grant Development Funds, the paving crew will be busy. “There is a sense
of ownership in the city streets, now that we have control over the
scheduling and paving,” Bell notes. “We’ll make the deadline.”
This has produced unforeseen benefits, too. “The
citizens have responded to our initiative, from cleaning up properties
to match their new pavement to offering paving crews lemonade when they
are in the neighborhood working,” says Terry Marshall, city engineering
inspector.
While far from caught up, Bell and Al-Ghafry
have conducted a walking survey of the streets to prioritize the paving
needs in Lemon Grove. The balancing act includes contracted milling
before the city crew applies fresh pavement. And an upcoming
cold-in-place pavement recycling demonstration will determine if that
method will be viable.
“The purchase of the equipment was a high-risk,
high-reward venture that we all have a stake in,” Al-Ghafry states. “But
if you don’t try...you’ve already failed.”
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Understanding the Concept Of Cracksealing
Pavement cracks develop due to expansion and
contraction caused by temperature fluctuation — even in Lemon Grove and
its “Best Climate on Earth.” These cracks allow water to penetrate the
pavement base and sub-base materials, causing pavement elements to lose
structural integrity. Once started, the cracking process continues to
grow and eventually deforms the pavement, causing potholes and,
ultimately, disintegration of the surface.
As public works director Thomas Bell notes, “The
cost of the cracksealer is easily equaled by one major repair, so the
return on investment is huge.”
Proper preparation of the crack, the type of
sealant, application methods, traffic loads, and continued deformation
of the crack all affect the extension in pavement life that cracksealing
supplies. Various transportation agencies estimate that pavement life
can be extended up to 10 years with a proper cracksealing program.
The 40-page Guide to Cracksealing can give
agencies and contractors a thorough understanding of the practice.
Available free from Cimline (through their Web site,
www.cimline.com, or
by calling 1-800-328-3874), the publication uses photos, charts, and
illustrations to educate road professionals on cracksealing concepts and
applications.
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