More repairs, fewer rebuilds could fix rutted roads sooner

Council Committee hears of plan that Could reduce wait By years

A decades-long schedule for fixing Regina’s worst roads has triggered widespread frustrations, but city staff say they’ve now found a way to speed up improvements without spending more money.

They foresee a shift from “comprehensive” rebuilding to surface treatments.

The idea came to council’s Public Works and Infrastructure Committee on Wednesday, months after residents filled council chambers in July to blast the 36-year estimate for addressing the city’s backlog of poor residential roads. Council tasked administration with finding a more reasonable time frame.

Currently, 21 per cent Regina’s residential roads are in poor condition, according to the city. About 30 per cent of those are in very poor condition.

The Residential Road Renewal Program, approved in 2013 and funded through dedicated mill rate increases, has made a dent in the problem — but not quickly enough for residents on the most rutted roadways.

Karen Gasmo, executive director of transportation and utilities, acknowledged that the current schedule is “not acceptable to council and residents.”

She proposed changes that could get all those roads to an acceptable state in 15 or even 10 years.

As currently designed, the program rebuilds the entire right of way of poor roads, including full replacement of sidewalks, gutters and curbs.

It also assesses underground infrastructure and renews assets at risk.

That costs $2 million per kilometre and takes three to six months to complete.

Gasmo proposed that many poor roads could be given surface treatment instead. That costs far less: about $180,000 per kilometre. It can take as little as two days to complete. Other roads might benefit from rehabilitation that falls short of a full rebuild, she suggested.

But surface treatment won’t restore roads to good physical condition or fix structural issues. It will still leave some drainage problems like ponding.

The point is to create a smooth road surface that offers an acceptable driving experience.

Without that solution, the only way to speed up the roadwork is to spend more money, Gasmo said.

Public Works and Infrastructure Committee unanimously endorsed the proposal on Wednesday, sending it to council’s budget meeting next month for final approval.

The plan calls for a one-year pilot in 2019, which will improve 11 kilometres of poor roads instead of the two or three kilometres slated for rebuild under the current policy.

Administration would then report back next fall before moving forward with a permanent change.

But Gasmo pointed out that the move to surface treatments does have some drawbacks. It will lead to a loss of curb height, and wouldn’t be workable for roads that have degraded so far that equipment would cause them to fail.