I appreciate all of your recent feedback regarding the City streets. Mr. Jones assures me that the stones will tighten up and this is a common practice on County roads. There was warning of if we chose to do it this way, there would be some mess involved. Please see the notes below to see how we got here. Mr. Jones can be reached at 773-4557, I can be reached at 774-4263 and our council members can be reached here: As always, I hope to find a fiscally responsible solution to make our roads safe. Thank you. Sixth Ward Wrandy Siarkowski wsiarkowski@cityofgloversville (518) 773-7135 Fifth Ward Jay Zarrelli jzarrelli@cityofgloversville (518) 848-2016 Fourth Ward Ellen Anadio eanadio@cityofgloversville (518) 773-0478 Third Ward Stephen Mahoney smahoney@cityofgloversville (518) 725-7794 Second Ward Arthur Simonds asimonds@cityofgloversville (518) 844-6905 First Ward Robin Wentworth rwentworth@cityofgloversville (518) 773-2765 Councilman-at-Large James Robinson jrobinson@cityofgloversville (518) 725-7079 Thank you to the Leader Herald for reporting on this issue. This is from meeting minutes for our 5/27/14 meeting: DPW Director Jones advised that as of April 1, 2014, the state transferred the responsibility of administering the CHIPS funding from the state DOT and Thruway Authority to the state Comptroller’s office, which has added new guidelines and regulations. The new guidelines require with any resurfacing project which alters the highway, the City must abide with the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and every street corner with sidewalks would need to be modified to meet the current ADA requirements making them handicapped accessible. Director Jones noted this expense would ultimately cut the number of streets it could repair with the CHIPS funding in half. He noted that the City’s previous approach of milling and filling would be considered altering the roadways, however, if the method of oil and stone treatment is used it is not considered as altering the roadway. Director Jones advised that he is working with a newly formed Committee which includes County Highway Superintendent Yost, Johnstown DPW Engineer Cotter and a representative from Gorman Brothers Paving to seek a solution for this new mandate. It was noted that a section of County Route 104 in Stratford was visited where the oil/stone process was done four years ago and has held up quite well. Mayor King noted that sidewalks are generally the responsibility of the home or business owner; and he is not sure how the state can issue this mandate. The General Services Committee scheduled a meeting on June 12th with the DPW Director to discuss the issue further. This is from our council meeting on May 27th: Last year, the city received approximately $360,000 in CHIPS funding, and paved 14 city streets across all six wards. This year, the city has received an additional $35,000 in CHIPS funding, Jones said. At first pass I thought it was great, until I read all the guidelines that came from the state Comptrollers Office on the CHIPS money, Jones said. Basically, they have told us that any resurfacing project we do, which alters the highway, we must abide with the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and every street corner we go by, the sidewalks would need to be modified to meet the current ADA requirements. Jones said as a result, the city would need to alter the four sidewalks and curbing at every intersection to make them handicapped accessible, which ultimately would cut the number of streets it could repair in half. As an example, he said repaving Prospect Avenue from Main Street to Kingsboro Avenue would have previously cost the city about $30,000, but with the concrete work at all the intersections, the cost would double. They have essentially given us an extra $35,000 with $100,000 in additional requirements to go with it, Jones said. Our street program, instead of 14 [streets], would be five. Jones said the city had a $1 million list last year of roads needing to be repaired. A third of the repairs on the list were completed last year, and in the ideal situation, the city would have moved on to the next third of the list this season, but other roads have fallen apart that werent on the citys radar, Jones said. He said the citys previous approach of milling and filling would be considered altering the roadway, but there are exceptions the city could consider. One exception is roadways without sidewalks, which are not affected by these stipulations. The other allows roadways to receive surface treatments consisting of oil and stone. He said the method of oil and stone treatment is a lot more economical than the price of asphalt, but it does create a messy situation for road crews and drivers. Its a process that works and weve used it for a long time, Jones said. The issue is, its messy and youre going to have some migrant oil and some migrant stones. Its going to be something that people are going to have to deal with. Both Mayor Dayton King and Jones said lobbying state officials would be the only solution to these new requirements, but that wont fix the problem within this construction season. Im not really sure how it works where the city is responsible for sidewalks, King said. I believe its the responsibility of the homeowner or business owner. The Common Council scheduled the General Services Committee to continue to discuss the new requirements at its next meeting June 12. This is from our June 24th meeting: The Common Council on Tuesday advised Department of Public Works Director Kevin Jones to move forward with the 2014 paving plan that would improve the surface of 23 sections of roadway throughout the city. The city had to change its paving system this year due to a new mandate within the annual Consolidated Highway Improvement Program funding. Jones said the state transferred the responsibility of administering the CHIPs funding from the state Department of Transportation and Thruway Authority to the state Comptrollers Office, which has added new guidelines and regulations. The new guidelines require any resurfacing project that alters the highway to abide with the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Every street corner the improvements pass, the sidewalks will need to be modified to meet the current ADA requirements. Jones said as a result, the city would need to alter the four sidewalks and curbing at every intersection to make them handicapped accessible, which ultimately would have cut the number of streets it could repair roughly in half. After paving 14 streets in 2013, the city was looking at only doing about five because of the sidewalk requirement. He said the citys previous approach of milling and filling would be considered altering the roadway, but there is an exception the city will use instead. Fact Box Taking it to the streets The 23 sections of Gloversville streets that are set to be improved include: E. Fulton St. from Judson to Main. E. Fulton St. from Kingsboro to the city line. Prospect Ave. from N. Main to Kingsboro. Fox St. from Oakland to E. Fulton. First Ave. from Yale to Kingsboro. Sixth Ave. from Kingsboro to East Blvd. Sixth Ave. from N. Main to Helwig. Swan St. from Grandview to end. Grandview Drive from Robin to end. Robin St. from Grandview to end. Raven St. from Kingsboro to Grandview. Kingsboro Ave. from E. Fulton to Newman. Eagle St. from Park to Kingsboro. Fremont St. from Forest to Steele. Montgomery St. from Washington to Steele. Grove St. from W. Fulton to Third. North Arlington Ave. from Grand to Spring. North Arlington Ave. from W. Eighth Ave to Grand. Union St. from North to James. Gregory St. from Kingsboro to Meadow. E. State St. from N. Main to Kingsboro. Brentwood Ave. from Northern Terrace to West State. Lee Ave. from Brentwood to end. The exception allows roadways to receive surface treatments consisting of oil and stone. He said oil and stone treatment is more economical compared to the price of asphalt, but it does create a messy situation for road crews and drivers. Jones said because of the economics of this alternative, the city can get more bang for their buck. Last year, he said, the city received about $360,000 in CHIPS funding, and paved 14 city streets across all six wards. This year, he said, the estimated cost of the project will be around $357,300 and will allow the city to treat 23 sections of road. He said because this work would be done through state contract, it wouldnt have to go out to bid going forward. Jones expects residents to see the work begin around August. If this alternative provides positive results, Jones said, the city would be able to treat every city street on a 10-year cycle, compared to the previous method where some streets went 50 years without being improved. We can cover a lot more ground and get to a lot of road we wouldnt have been able to in the past, Jones said. If we like it, we could touch each street in the city about every 10 years.
Posted on: Fri, 29 Aug 2014 11:24:34 +0000
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