Special Board of Aldermen 10-14-2021 Page 5
Dan Hudson, City Engineer
Yeah, absolutely. The measurement of PCI is a national standard so we will still score all the roads the same way. As
we do this program, we continue to learn. We continue to improve. As Mark mentioned, we've been trying to do a more
complete street project lately. So we keep expanding and modifying the program but the assessment methodology is
the same.
Alderman Klee
Madam President may | have some follow ups? Thank you. | appreciate that. One of the things | noticed - I'm just
gonna use one of the streets in my Ward was Glendale where you did the sidewalk. Right there on the edge, you put in
the tip down, the ADA ramp, and so on. One of the things - and | know part of is because of weather - that probably all
of us got the most complaints about was that there'd be a sign up that say, “It's gonna start June 1*“and then come July,
they still haven't started. But then they do start and then it's not until September because you have these multiple
contractors doing different - so | can say like Maywood and Glendale were two that | experienced close to my home.
How many contractors on average do you have in a particular road? | mean, this one here, we saw that they brought it
down to dirt. Then someone came through, as you said, and put that first layer in that looked like the road, but we knew
it wasn't because it was still too low, and then somebody else came through weeks later. Glendale actually kind of
started like June and they just - they actually they haven't just finished, they're still working on it. So you know, I'm
getting a lot of the neighbors that are saying what's the status on that and why don't we get updates? It would be too - |
know -too cumbersome for you to do at all but is that normal?
Dan Hudson, City Engineer
Yeah unfortunately it's challenging and the scheduling is an issue and that is normal. We do the best we can. We do
send out a weekly status about what roads we intend to work on that coming week and what the effort is on those, but it's
a continually changing thing. The milling when they mobilize to do milling, they try to mill a number of roads because
they bring in a big machine and that machine can be here all summer. So they mill a bunch of streets. So that may be
why you see the milling and then you don't see an activity for a while. But then all those other efforts that Engineer
Saunders mentioned have to occur and the contractor has to sub out that a lot of that work. So like the ramps in
particular, that's a subcontractor. It's been a very challenging year. Everyone in the industry - construction industry is
suffering from staffing issues. Of course, we're still dealing with COVID issues. There's been a whole host of challenges
this year. So we've been doing a big program and this has been a more challenging year than others. So there have
been roads that have been open a long time and we do understand why people get frustrated with that. It is frustrating.
It’s frustrating for us because we'll tell somebody, hey, we're going to be paving your road next week and then situations
happen outside of our control and we're not able to do that. So it is frustrating. We always struggle with that, you know,
trying to give enough information or as good information, but it's continually changing. So it is it is a hard thing to do
communication when it's continually changing.
Alderman Klee
Just one quick follow up. You can't see that I'm smiling underneath this mask but you guys are doing a great job and |
want to say that the contractor who are around my home were very accommodating to my neighbors and so on. One
was moving and they made sure that there was no activity going on the day she was moving in and moving out. They
had to build a temporary ramp for her to be able to get into a driveway. They did good things like that. And then when
we did have that leak, you were very responsive and got somebody out there to kind of take care of that issue. | do
understand exactly what’s going on and | hope the public can understand but you can understand it’s frustrating when
you have to keep going over these bumps and you're not sure when it's going to be going. | personally do send out that
list that Lauren is kind enough to send us and | believe many of my other colleagues do the same thing too. You put it
on your website and so on. But think they just get frustrated when they see this street is going to be on and then two
weeks later, nothing is happening on it. So thank you so much for all that you're doing.
Dan Hudson, City Engineer
Thank you. Yeah | understand all of that completely. Of course, we have weather issues too. So there are a lot of
challenges. We do the best we can, but we appreciate everyone's patience. | think when we leave, we leave a good
product and | think for the most part people are happy with it. So if you just continue to bear with us as we get through
the process, we appreciate that.
