Pricier oil reins in local paving plans
Towns seek ways to cut asphalt use
Thanks to the escalating price of oil, Belmont officials are hoping for the best but expecting the worst when they open the bids tomorrow to supply and install asphalt on the town's roads.
The officials are expecting a sizable jump in asphalt prices - from $65 a ton to perhaps $75 - but with oil prices climbing and some communities already paying upwards of $80, they are keeping their fingers crossed that the figures will not be even higher.
"I'm not sure how the skyrocketing costs are going to impact the bid," said town engineer Glenn Clancy. "We could be unpleasantly surprised."
Highway department administrators everywhere are figuring ways to cope with higher costs at a time when there's less money to go around.
Oil is a key ingredient in asphalt, and paving forces towns to use a lot of fuel for transportation and installation. So some communities are doing a little less roadwork while others are mapping out more efficient ways to stretch their pavement dollars.
In Belmont, the failure of the $2.5 million Proposition 2 1/2 override on June 9 was already forcing the community to cut back on road repairs, a situation that will be made worse now by the soaring prices it has to pay for asphalt, Clancy said.
In Lexington, a less expensive, but less durable, road repair called micro-surfacing will be used whenever possible this year where the town might have used more extensive repaving in the past, according to assistant town engineer David Cannon.
"We are tying to put more money into maintenance through crack management and micro-surfacing," he said, noting the cost of asphalt and installation in Lexington has gone up 25 percent in the past year.
"It's very hard to keep our budget increases in line with Proposition 2 1/2 when we're facing twenty-five percent increases," he said.
In 1999, Lexington adopted a pavement management plan aimed at changing the once-standard, worst-first approach to fixing town roads, Cannon said. The plan lets Lexington use a strategy that schedules road improvements neighborhood by neighborhood.
Many other communities have also adopted similar management plans to deal with road maintenance effectively and equitably. However, with costs rising, some have had to alter their plans in order to cope.
Haverhill is updating its management plan this summer. It has enlisted the help of the Merrimack Valley Planning Commission, which will have staff canvassing city streets to inventory their condition, according to commission transportation planner James Terlizzi.
The information gleaned by the staff this summer will be compiled into a management plan the city hopes will curb pavement costs. Such plans are getting more attention from officials across the state these days, he said.
"Instead of taking a 'worst-first' approach to road maintenance, these communities are taking more of a 'ground-zero' approach," Terlizzi said. "They want to get all the roadways in good condition and work from that point into the future. That may take a large investment in the first couple years, but it will pay off down the road."
Belmont appointed a Pavement Advisory Committee 18 months ago to assemble just such a plan, Clancy said, and it had mapped out a comprehensive program for curbing, sidewalk, and road reconstruction. But with the failure of the $2.5 million override, the town is almost back to worst-first road repairs.
"It's no longer feasible to consider the full boat" of planned repairs, Clancy said. "We're going to have to focus on pavement only and only on the major roads."
In Methuen, public works director Raymond DiFiore said streets overall may be in better shape than those in surrounding communities, thanks to $10 million in road improvements voters approved four years ago. Still, the city also has a pavement management program, with various techniques for conserving on asphalt, aimed at cutting costs.
"Some streets get total reconstruction, some get a reclamation, some get an overlay, some get micro-surfacing; it's sort of like a toolbox we have for road paving that is much more efficient," he said. "The old process was to take a ride around, look for the streets that were the worst, and pave them."
North Reading will be doing much the same, said public works director David Hanlon, who says the town was able to get a good deal on its asphalt contract by teaming with neighboring Middleton and Lynnfield.
The three towns joined forces several years ago to buy public works supplies in bulk, Hanlon said, and they were able to sign a deal recently that guarantees all three communities asphalt at $52 per ton for each of the next three years.
Still North Reading is cutting back on its pavement plans as well. "We're doing more crack-filling and more micro-surfacing," Hanlon said. "We're doing as much paving as we've ever done, we're just using a lot less asphalt." 