By Bob McGarry, Haddam First Selectman.
(May 9, 2021) — It’s Spring! The birds are chirping, the flowers blooming and the days are getting longer so it must be time to start road work! In this month’s column I’m going to discuss what we’ve planned for this year. As always, the project start dates and durations depend heavily on contractor availability, weather and the actual conditions found when the shovels hit the ground. I’ll start with a repeat of last year’s primer on road treatments.
- Chip seal – A term familiar to most of us as we see it often. It involves covering the road surface with an emulsifier/binder and 3/8-inch stones and then rolling it.
- Shim paving – Paving added to a road to establish the proper surface contour
- Mill and fill – Remove the top one to two inches of pavement and resurface
- Grind, grade and pave – The existing pavement is ground, regraded, and compacted. This is followed by two layers of asphalt
Work has already started on High Street and Lake Avenue. Public Works is doing extensive drainage work there. That will be followed with grinding, grading and paving. The other roads planned for this year are:
- Ague Spring Road, Basket Shop, Blue Hills Road and Plains Road – The unimproved (dirt or gravel) sections of these roads were covered with millings and rolled last year. To complete the upgrade, this year they’ll be chip sealed. The upgrade produces a better road that requires less maintenance. It also qualifies the road for town aid road funding from the state. Unimproved roads don’t qualify for those funds.
- Silver Springs Drive – Chip Seal
- Mill Run Lane – Chip Seal
- Arkona Drive – Chip Seal
- Jackson Road – Chip Seal
- Depot Road – Mill and fill
- Dublin Hill Road – Grind, grade and pave
- Calliari Place – Grind, grade and pave
- Maple Avenue West – Grind, grade and pave
- Parsonage Road – Grind, grade and pave
- Thayer Road – Grind, grade and pave
If the paving gods smile on us, we don’t get hit by a tropical storm and we have a very good year, in the fall we may be able to get to:
- Cedar Lake Road – Mill and fill
- Haddam View Heights – Grind, grade and pave
- Laurel Heights – Grind, grade and pave
- Maple Avenue East – Mill and fill
Drainage work is done on all roads to the extent that it’s needed. Poor drainage is one of the leading causes of road problems. All told, we’re looking at over one million dollars’ worth of road improvement. Most of that money will come from the bond we issued in June 2020.
