A tentative game plan has been presented to repair the brick surface of Allegheny River Boulevard in Oakmont.<\/p>\n
Shawn Wingrove, the borough\u2019s engineer, discussed some potential spot repair options along nearly a half-mile stretch of the street.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe talked about a lot of permutations, a lot of options, a lot of potential avenues over the last 18 or 24 months,\u201d Wingrove said.<\/p>\n
Brick roads in the borough have been a common topic of discussion. Borough officials recently made the decision to pave over Archie Street, a longtime brick road, after an emergency repair was needed for a hole that had formed in the street.<\/p>\n
Wingrove said discussions have included preserving the brick on Allegheny River Boulevard, from Washington to Pennsylvania avenues.<\/p>\n
In the short-term, he said, officials need to decide how to fix the bad spots in areas of the boulevard that are deemed \u201clong-term brick.\u201d Wingrove presented a plan for a spot repair program for this year.<\/p>\n
He said the borough carried out a similar plan years ago while repairing brick roads throughout the borough\u2019s neighborhoods. Work on the streets was decided based on their square yardage.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe bid a contract that set the bar for the base bid at a certain number of square yards,\u201d Wingrove said. \u201cWe had a priority list, then we had alternates depending on where the bids came in that we could add up to whatever our budget was.\u201d<\/p>\n
The program includes plans for crosswalk improvements, mobilization and traffic control.<\/p>\n
It calls for excavating the old brick and the sub-base below, addressing the earth below if needed and building everything back up.<\/p>\n
Wingrove said his team identified a tentative priority list of areas along the boulevard including 512 Allegheny River Blvd., the dip at 642 Allegheny River Blvd., and the intersection of Allegheny River Boulevard and Maryland Avenue in front of the clock tower.<\/p>\n
The recommendation to fix the dip would be to repair the brick from curb to curb, he said. It\u2019s unclear what causes the brick movement in that spot.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe dip is far more severe on the Allegheny Avenue side, but we want to fix it all the way across,\u201d Wingrove said.<\/p>\n
Alternate spots to fix include
\nthe intersection of Allegheny River Boulevard and Delaware Avenue, the crosswalk at 518 Allegheny River Blvd., the intersection of Allegheny River Boulevard and Washington Avenue, a section near the Oaks Theater, and a section in front of 736 Allegheny River Blvd.<\/p>\n
Councilman Jim Parsons mentioned that it\u2019s a common misconception of borough residents that bricks on the boulevard were replaced around 20 years ago. He said only spot repairs occurred at that time.<\/p>\n
Parsons raised the question of what would be done differently during this round of spot repairs to avoid needing to address repairs again so quickly.<\/p>\n
Wingrove said while he wasn\u2019t on the repair project 20 years ago, he suspects some of the sub-base concrete beneath the brick was not fully replaced where the borough is currently seeing failures in the road.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat sub-base may have continued to deteriorate underneath,\u201d Wingrove said. \u201cUnder this proposal, we would replace all of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Costs for fixes along the priority list are projected to be just under $340,000. Costs for alternate spots are projected to be a little more than $192,000.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe propose to open bids between your work session and regular meeting in August,\u201d Wingrove said.<\/p>\n
Borough Manager Scot Fodi said the borough has money for the current stage of the proposed project. In the future, as the project evolves and plans for the other sections of brick are addressed, the borough will reexamine costs.<\/p>\n
Council president Nancy Ride said borough officials are looking into grants for the work.<\/p>\n
Wingrove recommended council apply for a grant from the state\u2019s Multimodal Transportation Fund to replace bricks along the boulevard from Terrace Place to the entrance of Ace Hardware and Panera parking lot nearest to Boulevard Smiles.<\/p>\n
The borough, Wingrove said, can apply for up to $3 million in funding for the project.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe think it\u2019s worth throwing our hat into the ring for something here,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we get a lesser amount, then we can discuss materials.\u201d<\/p>\n
Council plans to vote on the proposed spot repair program and grant application July 20. Officials will continue to discuss funding and repair options for the future phases.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A tentative game plan has been presented to repair the brick surface of Allegheny River Boulevard in Oakmont.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241783,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[73,75,74],"class_list":["post-241782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241782\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}