City paves the way
$5M will pave gravel roadways throughout city
By Jeremy Warren, The StarPhoenix May 17, 2010
Dust is the worst part about the gravel road in front of Warren Campbell's hardware store on Avenue M South, in the centre of Saskatoon.
"We're constantly cleaning dust off our shelves," Campbell said in the office of his Home Hardware outlet. "Look at my desk," he said, moving his finger across the desktop and leaving a clean path through the dust.
Because the road outside the store, which Campbell owns with his sister, Shannon Brossart, is not paved, a slight breeze will kick up dust and push it through the store's entrance and loading bays. Traffic from heavy trucks creates washboard conditions on the street.
"I've driven over those ruts and it shakes the living daylights out of my car," Brossart said.
Throughout Saskatoon there are dozens of gravel streets in quiet residential neighbourhoods and busy industrial areas. This year the city is spending $5 million to pave those roads, including the one in front of the hardware store.
The 2010 funding for gravel road paving is 10 times the usual annual budget for these projects.
"It'll be nice to have it done," said Campbell. He doesn't believe the poor quality road has been bad for his business, but he said that a new road will make the area more attractive.
The city spent $3.1 million during the past four years to pave roads. After 2010, there's still more streets the city wants paved, but funding beyond the annual $500,000 budget hasn't been approved.
Another $6.5 million is needed to finish the roads that remain -- about three kilometres worth -- after the work planned for 2010 is done, said Cory Funk, infrastructure services project manager.
"You have $500,000 a year, and it doesn't cover much construction," Funk said. "It might cover three or four blocks at time."
Roads will be stripped and then layered with a fresh gravel base and asphalt. Some blocks will have sidewalks and sewage/water systems improved or installed.
Many of the gravel roads crisscross the west industrial areas, but they can also be found in neighbourhoods such as City Park and Pleasant Hill.
Unpaved roads in the city's centre create perception problems and hurt property values, said the city's neighbourhood planning manager, Alan Wallace.
"It does not project the image of a thriving city," he said. "Cities can let their cores die or fend for themselves, but we're not about to sit back and let the core crumble."
The city is fixing past mistakes of residents, Funk said. When original neighbourhoods were planned, property owners had a choice to pay for gravel or asphalt roads in new neighbourhoods.
"The money from lot sales is what pays for the roads, and when the original lot sales paid for roads, it was for gravel," Funk said.
"One hundred years later, we're back in the core trying to improve the neighbourhoods," Wallace said.
The city does get complaints from residents, but the regular, and most vocal, complaints are from the west industrial area, Funk said.
"These are businesses that have been here for many years and are taxpayers," he said. "They want a paved road. They don't want to see the washboards on the gravel roads. The roads see a lot of big trucks. By upgrading them, it's quieter, less dusty and looks like a city."
Upgrading roads in the west industrial area will make the area competitive with industrial areas elsewhere in Saskatoon, Wallace said.
"The area hasn't changed in 20 years, but it's suffered from lack of access to highways," he said. "(Paved roads) puts them on equal footing, transportation-wise."
Down the road from Home Hardware, Glenn Camrud, owner of Ram Mechanical and Marketing, has been pressuring city council to pave Avenue M South between 17th and 19th streets.
The gravel road -- dusty or muddy, depending on the weather -- doesn't reflect well on his business, Camrud said.
"We struggle to bring people here because it's a mudhole," he said. "It's embarrassing. . . .
We have professionals come here and I don't think living in a civil city we should be dealing with this."
Now that the street is slated for paving this year, Camrud lauds city council for funding the road work.
"They're going to do it, and that's all I care about," he said.
Across the river, in the Avalon neighbourhood, Kevin Jones lives along Niderost Street, a residential street unpaved for two blocks, between Melrose and McPherson avenues, except for the asphalt road that intersects the two streets. For two blocks, the dirt street is marked with dozens of potholes the size of dinner plates.
The city has Niderost Street on its to-do list, but it's on the list of unfunded, unscheduled streets.
"I pay taxes, so why shouldn't it be paved?" Jones said. "I pay $2,300 in taxes. You cut that 80 per cent and I won't complain about the dirt road."
Unpaved roads have always bothered city engineers, but the city needed a political push to start working, Funk said.
"It's not like these roads are all of a sudden failing," he said. "It's always been an issue. Council just decided it was a priority. The main issue is the people want them, and the city wants them."
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PLANNED PAVING IN 2010
- Avenue O South between 16th and 17th streets
- Avenue M South between 17th and 19th streets
- 18th Street West between Avenue L and Avenue N
- 17th Street West between Avenue Q and Avenue S
- 107th Street along east train tracks for 700 metres
- Lauriston Street from Second Avenue to Ninth Avenue
- Warburton Street between Seventh Avenue and qoth Avenue
- Wheaton Avenue between 46th and 47th streets
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