Jourdanton street project to begin in June 2020




As shown above, Crouch Street in Jourdanton is just one example of how bad the pot holes are on many streets in town. LEON ZABAVA | PLEASANTON EXPRESS

As shown above, Crouch Street in Jourdanton is just one example of how bad the pot holes are on many streets in town. LEON ZABAVA | PLEASANTON EXPRESS

This summer, the City of Jourdanton is scheduled to begin its $3.7 million street project. The project was detailed at two council workshops held last June, as reported by Leon Zabava. The streets included are high traffic streets, scheduled to be completely rebuilt and paved and the drainage work completed during the 2019-2020 fiscal year.

Funding for the project comes from the $4,050,000 in Certificates of Obligation (COs) that were approved at the Aug. 19 Jourdanton City Council meeting, with council members Raul Morales, Karen Pesek and Jack R. Harrison voting in favor. Council member (at that time) Johnetta Goetzel voted against and Chester Gonzales was not in attendance. Also included in the COs is $170,000 for a water park and splash pad.

The project will begin in June and includes the following streets: a) Jiffy Blvd. (from Highway 97 through the intersection with Lillian Ave.) b) La Garde St. (entire length of street/Peach St. (from Highway 16 to La Garde St.) c) Jourdanton Ave. (from Highway 97 through the intersection with E St. ). Note this is a truck route. d) Elm St. (from Highway 16 through the intersection with Campbell Ave.) e) Tamarac St. (from Highway 16 to County Road 438). Plus one block of Cantrell Ave. (the block between Tamarac St. and Fig St.) f) McDowell Ave. (between Beech St. and Oak St.) Oak St. (from McDowell Ave. to Highway 97) g) Maple St. (from Highway 97 through the intersection with McDowell Ave.) h) Broadway St. (from Highway 16 to Brown Ave.)

Jourdanton City Manager Lamar Schulz discussed how some roads long ago were not built as wide as they should be. This stemmed from cars being smaller, as well as saving money by paving a smaller piece.

“That also though has created problems because people build things out towards it. We’ve got a situation where there are driveways that go out to that, and there’s cement that we have to cut to expand the street,” said Schulz.

A good example of where they are going to widen the road is where Peach St. turns into La Garde behind the school. Schulz noted how buses travel down that road every day, too.

“If a 72-passenger bus is coming there, you better stop and back away to give them room to come around. It should be better once this work is done,” Schulz said.

He has been working with the school district to help some of the drainage issues behind the school. Since the two streets really drop off and are so much lower, the water goes in that direction, explained Schulz.

“We are going to do that one first,” said Schulz.

He hopes the weather cooperates and everything else falls into place, so that it can get done before school starts again.

The streets are not necessarily listed in order of priority, as they will be based on how things work with the contractor.

“For example, Jiffy and Jourdanton Ave. have to be done at different times because these big trucks need one of them…if we’re working on this one, then the other has got to be open,” said Schulz.

He added, “Right there by Chile Bandera, that’s going to be concrete, because it will last a lot longer. It will hold up better to the big trucks. We’re going to be working on the drainage to that ditch with all new pipes underneath it. We’re going to be working to make sure that the grade of the street is such that the water is going down through the pipes and then into that drain. Hopefully that will eliminate any kind of ponding up there that messes up the street.”

That section will only go up to Lillian Ave.

“This is a big project for us. This is something over $3.7 million because we’re not just paving over them. We’re actually taking them back down to nothing and the base and everything from then on up,” said Schulz. “It is going to be much improved.”

Schulz said they will not be using chip seal or any lesser methods.

“They are going to be good quality materials. I’m expecting at a minimum the streets should last about 15 years, without needing major maintenance,” said Schulz.

Another area in which the city will address the drainage situation is by the cemetery, which is why the one block of Cantrell is included in the project.

Said Schulz, “I don’t know if you’ve been on that little street lately, but the back side of the cemetery… it’s horrible. What’s happened is, some time ago there were pipes below Tamarac. The big trucks and all have crushed those pipes to where now the water can’t flow, so it’s backing up and just destroying the street. We wanted to go ahead and get that taken care of and so new pipes are going to be in there, taking the water to the other side.”

Potholes

For years, Jourdanton residents have complained about large potholes in the city.

While Jourdanton residents can call in to Jourdanton City Hall to report potholes, the list is already long.

“We have a two-man crew that does potholes,” said Schulz. “They’re out there patching every day. They are so far behind and the streets are in such bad shape. If you fix this one here, then over here you have another problem.”

He addressed how fixing all of the streets is a long-term plan, as one can see how much it costs just to do the streets in this particular project slated to start in June.

Most of the city streets are bad enough that they need to be repaved in the same way, noted Schulz. On his desk sits a small container with two small pieces of asphalt that show what typical pavement looks like on Jourdanton streets.

“That is the top layer that they added more recently on top of some of these streets. It didn’t hold up. We had to keep that, just so people can be aware.”

The asphalt pieces measure a little over one-half inch. If it is not thick and the street is bad below it, it will not take long for the street to break up, said Schulz.

He mentioned a project done in another town, in which an area was completely redone and four inches of asphalt was added to get it where it needed to be.

“It was a great product in the end, but at lots of expense,” said Schulz.

“People don’t realize, it’s not cheap to fix those things and so it’s best if you’ve been maintaining them.”

This has not been done, and now the city is playing catch-up for many years of neglect.

On Jan. 31, the city workers were scheduled to be on Brown St. patching potholes, noted Schulz.

“That’s what he’s been doing in a lot of cases, just going to a particular street that’s got a lot of them and just have them go the whole length of the street. Some of them get so bad, that I mean what are you going to do, you really need to get to the root of the problem, which is down to the base. Something has happened to where it’s not stable and things go down and of course, if it gets to a low spot and water sits therewater is the enemy of asphalt, it will eventually break it down.”

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