Finance Committee - Minutes - 4/18/2018 - P9
Finance Committee - 4/18/2018 Page 9
catch them before they fall into a category where you have to spend four to five times the amount of money to
rebuild the street. Streets that are gone, people ask this question all the time, my street is in bad condition why
are you not doing it? Well it’s simply because of that. We have to try and spend some money on those streets
that are in better condition before they fall into bad condition. So that’s how we came up with this list of streets.
We had to go through a lot of coordination with utilities, Pennichuck and Gas, Liberty Utilities, because they
themselves have utilities that are deteriorating and you want to make sure you don't pave a street and they
have a replacement project. So we actually send our list to these utilities and they clear the streets. This year
actually 40 or so street segments were removed from the list recommended by the consultant in order for the
utilities to look at their program. They themselves have a program and they have to look at four or five years
down the road and put their budget accordingly.
We also have to look at our sewer condition as well. The City owns the sewers. The inner city sewers are old,
a lot of them going back to the 1800’s. We do have a problem there. So we have cleared some of the streets
regarding the sewers as well. We don't have a very good picture of the condition of the sewers because we
have approximately 90 miles of very old sewers. So if we look at a sewer year and there are some materials
that are more prone to decay, we pull those streets out and say “look we have to examine these sewers more
closely”. Again, you don’t want to pave the street and have a sewer failure. So several streets got removed
from the list while we do the sewer assessment as well. So in the end, we ended up with | think 25 streets that
are going to be in this program. We have three bidders, Newport is the lowest bidder and we still are working
with them to make sure they can meet the schedule. We would like to have all the streets done this year
because we have a lot more coming and we are asking for the approval.
Mayor Donchess
Questions?
Alderman Laws
So last night at Beer with the Mayor, a couple constituents are concerned about having bike paths. So | see
Concord Street is on there and | drive down Concord Street all the time. | see people are constantly walking
their dogs, there is a lot of foot traffic, is it too late in this process to include on at least some of the higher
traffic streets, something like a bike path?
Mr. Dookran
No it’s not too late. Actually the Director of Public Works, Director Fauteux has brought to my attention actually
today that we should look at the City’s bike plan. Recommendations as to where we should be looking for
priority bike lanes were given by Economic Development so | have that plan at the office and we are looking
more closely. When we pave a street like Concord Street, it has to be re-striped so here is an opportunity
where we can look at a total width existing width and can we narrow the travel lanes to get some extra
pavement that we can put a four foot wide bike lane. So we are going to be looking at that. And we have done
that in the past, we have been, over the years, like Water Street and Main Dunstable Road, we added shoulder
lines so that you do have a space. Sometimes we can’t meet the required amount of space for bike lanes
required by say Federal Highway Standards, but if you were to get three feet, that’s still a safer space for a
person to walk even if you don’t have a sidewalk or bike. So we do look at these things and we will continue to
do so with this program.
Alderwoman Kelly
Thank you. It was an interesting winter. | wanted to know how much of that affects your plan and which roads
that you go to. Do you go back in afterwards, we had a lot of hot and cold?
Mr. Dookran
| don’t quite get....
