Board OKs repaving, curb other projects
Both bids come in under budget, and officials say light winter also helped
Several neighborhoods in Montgomery Township will see their roads repaved this year, and several others will have their curbs and sidewalks done ahead of similar paving next year.
Township officials have approved the annual contracts to pave several township roads, and to upgrade and install curbs and sidewalks on a different set of roads ahead of paving in 2018.
“We awarded a bid for our 2017 curb and sidewalk replacement projects. That’s where we go and replace curbing and sidewalks
in various neighborhoods in the community, and do handicapped access ramps on streets where we’re going to be doing our paving next year,” said Township
Manager Larry Gregan.
The two contracts were awarded by unanimous votes during the supervisors’ Feb. 27 meeting, and were based on bids received after a public bidding process and vetting by township staff and engineering consultants. The road repaving contract
was awarded to contractor James D. Morrissey Inc. at a bid price of $469,174.80, well below the budgeted amount of $674,020 that had been included in the township’s 2017 budget based on prior years.
“When we would do the curbs and sidewalks in the same year we would do the paving on the streets, there was always the risk of them conflicting: not getting the curbs and sidewalks done before the paving,” Gregan said. “Now, since we do them on different years, they don’t overlap on the same street, and the neighbors have more access to their street this way.”
The curb and sidewalk contract was awarded to contractor Olivieri & Associates Inc. of Philadelphia at a cost of $342,460.70, below the $408,590 included in the township’s 2017 budget that was based on expenses in prior years.
“When we do the paving in a separate year from the curbs and sidewalks, it’s not as disturbed for as long on their street. It’s just a couple of days each year,” Gregan said.
A relatively light winter meant relatively fewer potholes in need of repair, and Gregan said the low number was thanks in part to the township’s effort to stay
ahead on paving.
“We didn’t have the freeze-thaw cycle that we’ve had in other years, which is generally what causes potholes. You get freezing, it heaves up the roadway, then moisture gets in there when it heats up and thaws, it settles down, and cracks the asphalt,” Gregan said. “We don’t get a lot on our streets — the townshipowned streets — because of our aggressive resurfacing program.”
Also approved at the board’s Feb. 27 meeting was a bid award for reconstruction of a hockey court at Spring Valley Park, which Gregan said will take place in late spring or early summer and was this year’s part of an ongoing schedule of repairing park and athletic facilities throughout the township.
The board also accepted six stormwater basins in various township neighborhoods into a naturalization program, by which staff stop cutting the grass short and allow the basins to grow out into more natural states.
“We don’t cut them any more, and we evaluate the fencing around them, to determine if we’re going to need the fencing in the long term after it starts to deteriorate. If we don’t need it,
we take it down, because it helps us maintain the basins,” he said.
The board also voted to waive land development requirements for the AMC 309 Cinema at Welsh Road and Bethlehem Pike, which Gregan said is largely located in Horsham Township but a portion of the parking on that site is located within Montgomery.
“There’s already an abundance of parking in that shopping center, so they’re adding additional green space, they’re updating the building, and providing for a new entrance off of Bethlehem Pike,” said Gregan.
The board also approved the spring and summer 2017 lists of Parks and Recreation programs and fees, which can be found in Parks department newsletters or online at the website for Montgomery’s Community and Recreation Center, www.MontCRC.org.