July 23, 2014 at 2:10 p.m.
Widespread dust control will wait
Jay County Commissioners
It's too late to make any changes for this year, but the Jay County Road Committee is taking a proactive stance on dust control for 2010.
With $100,000 earmarked for dust control in this year's budget, the committee decided there's not much they could do this year, considering the residential dust mat program has already been advertised throughout the county.
That means the only sections of stone roads this year treated with magnesium chloride, a salt that firms up stone roads to reduce dust, will be those paid for by residents. Those sections, which are typically near residential properties, must be a minimum of 400 feet.
"We just tread water from now until the new budget," said member Ray Gabbard.
"If we had the money to (apply dust control to more miles of stone roads) it'd be simple," said committee member Gary Theurer, a member of the county council. "We wouldn't have a road committee."
The county will subsidize residential dust mat customers this year, who pay half of the 58 cents per foot cost while the county picks up the other half. Last year, those customers paid to have about 17 miles total of stone roads treated.
It costs the county about $3,050 to cover a mile of stone road with the salt, so covering all 242 miles of stone roads in the county is impossible.
The county started the first couple years just covering customer amounts, but went big and treated about 120 miles of roads in 2007. But keeping up those amounts is cost prohibitive. Last year the county decided to just handle paying customers and have taken the same approach this year.
"The roads are still seeing the remains and after-effects," said highway superintendent Ken Wellman on the lasting effects of the salt. "They're still hard."
The effects, however, don't last forever, as Wellman said the roads are beginning to soften up again. The firmness of the road helps the highway department save on stone, since gravel isn't tossed off the roadway as quickly and isn't pushed off by snowplows in the winter as easily either.
"It hardens it up but it's not the catch-all we thought," Wellman said.
"It really does firm up the soft spots ... like concrete," said committee president Faron Parr.
"It makes it a lot better for the people living in the country," agreed Gabbard.
Like most problems, though, money is the issue when it comes to maintenance on stone roads. It costs about $3,050 to spray a stone road per mile, about $25,000 per mile to do a triple seal, and around $100,000 per mile to use hot mix.
"That tells you how many roads we'll be doing at that price," Wellman said.
The highway department is already squeezed anyway. With a $825,000 budget for road maintenance, Wellman said around $668,500 of that will go directly into repairing chip and seal roads around the county. The remaining money is used for adding stone.
"I'll be lucky to get the mileage done I need to," he said. "If we're skimping on the chip and seal maintenance we're going to have problems in the future."
Wellman did not know coming into the meeting that the commissioners had set aside an additional $100,000 for roads, but he estimated about $25,000 of that will be used to cover the county's half on the dust mat program.
Although it would be nice to take the remaining $75,000 and do more dust control work, it's not enough to make a major dent into the total roadways, Wellman said he'll probably take that extra cash and use it to purchase more stone for roads that need it.
The road committee agreed it would like to do more, since salt improves the quality of stone roads, so they've decided to look forward to next year and see if the county council would be willing to put forth a bit more money. Budget time is around the corner and the committee members agreed now would be the best time to consider it.
Theurer said the road committee should come to next week's meeting to propose the idea and see how the others react, though warned the council is being cautious in this economic climate.
"Let's see what they'll give to the commissioners," he said.[[In-content Ad]]
With $100,000 earmarked for dust control in this year's budget, the committee decided there's not much they could do this year, considering the residential dust mat program has already been advertised throughout the county.
That means the only sections of stone roads this year treated with magnesium chloride, a salt that firms up stone roads to reduce dust, will be those paid for by residents. Those sections, which are typically near residential properties, must be a minimum of 400 feet.
"We just tread water from now until the new budget," said member Ray Gabbard.
"If we had the money to (apply dust control to more miles of stone roads) it'd be simple," said committee member Gary Theurer, a member of the county council. "We wouldn't have a road committee."
The county will subsidize residential dust mat customers this year, who pay half of the 58 cents per foot cost while the county picks up the other half. Last year, those customers paid to have about 17 miles total of stone roads treated.
It costs the county about $3,050 to cover a mile of stone road with the salt, so covering all 242 miles of stone roads in the county is impossible.
The county started the first couple years just covering customer amounts, but went big and treated about 120 miles of roads in 2007. But keeping up those amounts is cost prohibitive. Last year the county decided to just handle paying customers and have taken the same approach this year.
"The roads are still seeing the remains and after-effects," said highway superintendent Ken Wellman on the lasting effects of the salt. "They're still hard."
The effects, however, don't last forever, as Wellman said the roads are beginning to soften up again. The firmness of the road helps the highway department save on stone, since gravel isn't tossed off the roadway as quickly and isn't pushed off by snowplows in the winter as easily either.
"It hardens it up but it's not the catch-all we thought," Wellman said.
"It really does firm up the soft spots ... like concrete," said committee president Faron Parr.
"It makes it a lot better for the people living in the country," agreed Gabbard.
Like most problems, though, money is the issue when it comes to maintenance on stone roads. It costs about $3,050 to spray a stone road per mile, about $25,000 per mile to do a triple seal, and around $100,000 per mile to use hot mix.
"That tells you how many roads we'll be doing at that price," Wellman said.
The highway department is already squeezed anyway. With a $825,000 budget for road maintenance, Wellman said around $668,500 of that will go directly into repairing chip and seal roads around the county. The remaining money is used for adding stone.
"I'll be lucky to get the mileage done I need to," he said. "If we're skimping on the chip and seal maintenance we're going to have problems in the future."
Wellman did not know coming into the meeting that the commissioners had set aside an additional $100,000 for roads, but he estimated about $25,000 of that will be used to cover the county's half on the dust mat program.
Although it would be nice to take the remaining $75,000 and do more dust control work, it's not enough to make a major dent into the total roadways, Wellman said he'll probably take that extra cash and use it to purchase more stone for roads that need it.
The road committee agreed it would like to do more, since salt improves the quality of stone roads, so they've decided to look forward to next year and see if the county council would be willing to put forth a bit more money. Budget time is around the corner and the committee members agreed now would be the best time to consider it.
Theurer said the road committee should come to next week's meeting to propose the idea and see how the others react, though warned the council is being cautious in this economic climate.
"Let's see what they'll give to the commissioners," he said.[[In-content Ad]]
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