It has been years since I heard a Council Committee present its report in open session. This night however, five of the Council's special committees and/or liaisons presented a report at the beginning of the session. The Committees were;Finance, Economic Growth,and Road Construction Oversight. Councilor Carter as liaison to the BOE and Councilor Reid the PMUA liaison gave short summaries of their relationship with their respective self governing bodies.
Rather then discuss all of them I shall just focus on the report of the Chairman of the Road Construction Oversight Committee, Councilor Mapp.
He recommended that the city adopt a yearly budget of approximately $6 million for road resurfacing. He acknowledge that economic situations may cause a variation in that figure. The present engineering report on the roads although several years old should be used as a starting point to determine the annual priority for street resurfacing. depending on state of deterioration and degree of usage.
Councilor Mapp suggested a review of present Ordinances relating to the opening and their repair noting that the life of a resurfacing should be between 15 and 20 years. He also mentioned that coordination with the utilities before resurfacing is important to prevent planned work from being done shortly after the payment had been completed.
Noting that the estimated cost four years ago for the complete work proposed at that time was about $65 million, an application should be made for "stimulus funds" ASAP. He was of the opinion that an end of Feb deadline existed.
Another suggestion was that our legislators press the State to resurface Route 28 which runs on South Ave from the Fanwood line via Fifth Street to Plainfield Ave to West Front Street up to Dunellen. However, if memory serves me right years ago ,perhaps when West 4th and 5th streets were made one way the city took over the responsibility of maintaining the highway within its limits. That is why we had the South Ave. fiasco. I am sure some one in administration can give a status report.
Councilor Reid suggested that the city keep a posting of streets that were scheduled for pothole repair.
In my own opinion more emphasis should be hot patching and tar sealing bad areas as soon as the weather and temperature permits. Also a high priority must be given to tarring road cracks especially the longitudinal ones. This is a case of " a stitch in time saves nine". When cold patching is done even small pavement loss should be treated not ignored as has happened too often. Cold patches might last longer if heavy compression is used and not relying on traffic to complete the job.
For any visitor to the city the state of the streets makes a lasting impression about community pride and concern.
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Doc,
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that "waiting for state aid" has been the Plainfield administration's mantra for years...and the lack of improvement and continued decline in this city are the result. Plainfield refuses to make the tough decisions required to clean up this mess of a city and become self-sufficient once again...after all, the politicians would lose their votes...
Doc:
ReplyDeleteI did not mean to imply that the end of February was the deadline for the submission of stimulus funds applications; I simply meant that we should not wait and that we should make the end of February Plainfield’s deadline. We should get in line as soon as possible.
Regards,
Adrian
I thank Councilor Mapp for the clarification of his remarks. I could not understand how a deadline could be established for something not yet in existence, but in his other official capacity he might have been privy to discussions underway. He is absolutely right. Plainfield should be at the ehad of the line for a change, not rushing belately to catch up.
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