Street progress!

This morning at 7:00 am I was awakened by the sound of a buzz saw. No, it wasn't Spouse's snoring, although he often sounds like a buzz saw. It was an actual buzz saw, slicing off about 15 inches of our stamped concrete driveway.
From having attended the street planning meeting I knew this would be the result of the city's decision to 'straighten the street'. They had to remove the 15 inches of driveway that will become the edge of the new street.

Once that was done the grinder showed up. This machine basically slices several inches of hard or soft surface, grinds it up, and places it onto a long conveyor belt that dumps into a trunk to be hauled away.

Here's a close-up so you can better see what it does.

Although the 'straightening' of the street resulted in loosing some of our driveway, it will also result in regaining some of our yard. When the street was initially paved the contractor must not have measured it correctly because they rounded the corner too sharply and paved over a portion of our yard. This is being corrected and we will get that part of our yard back.

The photo above shows the area we will get back. See that area of dirt/sand/gravel where the man in the blue jeans is standing on the far right? That is the approximate location of where our yard will extend to once the street is finished.

Here's a wider view of the grinder shooting into the bed of the dump truck.

It was kind of exciting to have all those guys working here yesterday. After so many weeks (which felt like months) of no progress, yesterday's noise, dirt, and flurry of activity was a welcome change.

I'm trying not to get my hopes up for a quick completion, despite all the progress made today. We're supposed to have rain tonight which will make the street a muddy mess (again) and the workers won't return until it dries up.

It is definitely encouraging to finally see some progress, which feels like a small light has been found at the end of a very long and dark tunnel.

Crush du Jour: Craig Robert Young

Oh the irony

As I mentioned here, my neighbor was told that the entire city-wide street improvement project(which includes our street) was supposed to be done by May 8, or June 27. The correct date depends on who you talk to.

All of the other streets are getting much simpler improvements. As I've walked the dog I noticed in some cases they ripped out broken/crumbling curbs and replaced them with new ones. In some cases they removed sections of cracked asphalt (leaving them with loose gravel and dirt) and will replace the street surface. Our street had the most involved work: a complete reconstruction. That is because they completely removed our street, planted drainage pipes, and plan to correct the curvature of the street ("straighten" the street) when they pave it. Someday. Maybe by June 27.

With all the rain we've had, my neighbor got frustrated with the swamp-like condition of our street and called and emailed the city manager. He suggested that if the street was not going to be paved very soon, a temporary fix should be implemented, such as a layer of fine gravel distributed over the street, to mitigate the mud and pooling of rain water. One day last week the construction company delivered the equivalent to a wheel barrow full of gravel and smoothed it over the puddle in front of my neighbor's house. That's it. That's what they felt they could do to mitigate the mud and pooling of rain water.

Despite all the calls and emails from my neighbor and other frustrated residents to finish our street, yesterday the road stripper began working on the street that runs parallel to ours. It stripped off the top layer of asphalt, in preparation to resurface the street.

It is unthinkable to me why the city would allow what used to be our street to remain in this condition while they continue to do construction work on other streets.

Just pave the damn street already!

You may have noticed this has become a real source of frustration to me. This is the 10th week of street reconstruction, and the 6th week since any progress was made on our street. Every time we walk the dog, get the mail, take out the trash, or get into our cars our shoes get muddy/dirty/sandy. Despite wiping our feet thoroughly on the door mats we've still managed to track a beach worth of sand into our house. We now have to leave our shoes on the front porch to keep from ruining our wood floors. I'm really getting sick of it.

Crush du Jour: Brandon Beemer

Rainy days and Mondays...

For the last 6 days we've had rain, scattered showers, or drizzle. Looking at the forecast I see that for the next 6 days we have the exact same thing in store. How exciting! Its like living in Seattle or Portland, only without the progressive people.

This wet weather has put a 'damper' on the street reconstruction, or so says the engineering firm. There has been no work on our street in over a month, and they claim its because they're waiting for a "significant drying". I hate to be the one to inform them, but its Spring and that is when we get a fair amount of rain. Waiting for a "significant drying" in April/May is like waiting for roses to bloom in November. In other words, it ain't too likely.

This has been the condition of our street for the last 6 days, and will likely continue to be for at least the next 6 days:
This photo actually makes the street look much smoother than it really is. It is very uneven, with pot holes and lumps.

My neighbor is getting mixed messages from the city regarding the completion of the entire street project, which includes but is not exclusive to our street. Earlier was told the end date was this coming Fri. Now he's being told the project end date is June 27, but that the engineering firm feels confident they will finish much sooner than that, despite the rainy weather and the lack of work done on our street over the last month.

As you can tell by the tone of this, I am getting pretty frustrated. Every time I walk the dog, go to the mail box, put the trash out for pick up, or chat with my neighbors I must walk on the street, which is wet and muddy. And when its not wet and muddy, its dry and dirty and sandy. Either way, its made a mess of our shoes and cars.

I'm ready for it to be done.

Crush du Jour: Jared Leto

Street

As I've mentioned before, we live in a very small historic town, which later changed its status to become a city. It still looks and functions like a small town.

Our street is only about a 1/2 block long, and there are just 4 houses on either side, all with small yards. It is a one-way street due to it being so narrow, and there is no on-street parking. It used to be a gravel alley, which was eventually paved.

Our little street has no curbs, sidewalks, or storm water drainage so when it rains the water runs off into our yards, which is fine, and it puddles in the low areas of the street, which is not fine. The latter has become troublesome. When the water forms large, shallow ponds in the street it requires dog walkers to walk in neighbors' yards' to bypass the ponds. When vehicles drive through the ponds it splashes water everywhere. And in the winter the ponds have frozen, creating a dangerous environment for drivers and pedestrians.

So last summer several neighbors and I attended a city meeting where street improvements were discussed. I learned that the city had planned to repair and resurface several streets with too many patches or potholes, and planned to completely replace our street after storm water drains had been installed. Hurray! We'll be able to see our tax dollars at work. We were told the project would start in the spring, but we'd be notified prior to the start of construction.

On Tues several construction guys walked up and down the street locating all the utilities and spray painting the street, driveways, and yards with neon yellow, orange, blue, and pink.

On Wed more construction guys arrived with blue prints, surveying equipment, and short wooden stakes with colored flags on them.

Today several pieces of heavy-duty construction equipment were delivered, along with some huge steel platforms. They were delivered to the vacant lot across the street from our house. The lot is owned by someone, but I guess the city has decided they will use it as a staging area.

So much for being notified prior to the start of construction. Or, maybe they don't consider this "construction". Maybe this is simply construction foreplay.

The start of this street re-construction project stirs mixed feelings in me. On the positive side it will be great to have storm water drainage and a new street surface that won't turn into a giant pond when it rains.

But on the negative side they are going to straighten out the direction of the street, which will shorten our driveway by about 10". Also, I am NOT looking forward to all the noise, dirt in the air, and inconvenience.

They will be completely ripping up and removing the existing street, so jack hammers will surely provide an annoying soundtrack to their work for a few days. Then there's the beeping sound from the bulldozer and front-end loaders when in reverse gear. Then there's the clanging and clanking of steel and concrete as the drainage basins are installed. For most people who leave the house to go to work, this isn't a big deal. But to people like me who work at home, it is a much bigger consideration.

Let's not forget about all the dirt that will be stirred up and blown around, either. Our house, porch, porch furniture, and cars will be covered in dirt daily, just as they were when a nearby construction project took place.

Oh wait - not our cars - they won't be covered in dirt because we won't be able to park them in our driveway! That's right. Since construction will begin at 7am and go til 5 or 6pm each day, we will not be able to park in our driveway during those hours, unless we want to risk being blocked in the entire day. So we will have to park our cars on alternate streets and walk to and from our house.

They estimate this will take 4-6 weeks, but I am betting it will take at least 8 weeks. Project are rarely completed by the estimated date, due to weather/rain and other conditions.

Reading back over this I sound like a crotchety old man! I suppose I should look at the bright side and think about how nice it will be when its all over.

Crush du Jour: Brian Carr