CITY COMPLETES STREET ASSESSMENTS EARLY

A three-year comprehensive program to evaluate the condition of every block of city street is nearing completion about a year ahead of schedule.

Kevin McMeel, assistant public works director, said Wednesday the "Pavement Management System" will enable the city to set priorities for street repairs and replacement.

"We had set it up to be a three-year survey," McMeel said. "This is the second year, but we went beyond our projections and got almost all the city done."

He said the trick now is to take the information gathered in the survey and then plug into the computer and make sense of it.

"What we're trying to do now is get the information quantified -- trying to find out how much work has to be done," he said.

The program then can be used as a means to set priorities for street repairs and set budgets for such things as the city's annual asphalt overlay program.

"We'll use that as one basis to determine what streets need the overlay," McMeel said. "But we'll also use it for just routine maintenance.

"When you put a dollar into a street that's still in fairly good condition, it's like putting $4 in when it's in really bad shape," he said. "It's much more efficient use of tax dollars when you can identify problems and make repairs before the street gets too bad."

The program involved a physical inspection of each street in Cape Girardeau. Information then was fed into a computer, which rates the street on a scale of zero to 100, based on its deterioration, cost of available repair options, and the available funding.

Emmett Baker Jr., Cape Girardeau's projects coordinator, and Howard Propst, technician, inspected close to 1,500 city blocks.

But McMeel said their work will pay off because the city will be able to determine which street projects will give the best return for tax dollars -- avoiding a "worst-first" scenario.

McMeel said that too often the city has had to react to problems by paving badly deteriorated streets without fully knowing the reason for the streets' disrepair.

Once maintenance costs are applied, city officials will better be able to draft an appropriate streets budget.

"Or, if you're dealing with a set budget amount, it allows you to set priorities," he said. "You can also use the program as justification for more maintenance dollars if they're needed."

Charles Haubold is chairman of the city's planning and zoning commission. That commission will meet next month to consider possible changes in the city's master streets plan.

Haubold said Wednesday that information from the pavement management system will be a valuable tool for determining future street projects.

"I think it could give us some idea of what's on the city's mind," Haubold said. "If this program can be used to explain that this street is not as bad as the one over there, then I think it will be an important tool.

"Maybe then we can look at it a little differently -- more objectively -- and not cause the city as much grief with our street priorities."

Included on the master streets plan are improvements to Perryville Road and Hopper Road, for example. Haubold said the commission has "kicked around" both projects without really affirming a priority. "Maybe this program can be used to answer that problem," he said.

McMeel said the pavement management program can provide "objective figures" on the condition of a street such as Perryville Road.

"The whole key is not just to tell you what you already know -- that the street's in bad shape -- but to give you some kind of idea of how bad it is in relation to other streets and in relation to the costs to repair the street," he said.

The information gleaned from street inspections also can be presented to the public to illustrate street needs and persuade voters to support a tax measure for transportation.

City officials have touted such a measure for years to fund major street projects. Widening of Broadway, Independence and Bloomfield Road and improvements to Perryville and Hopper Roads are just some of the projects that will be difficult to do without additional financing, officials have said.