TORRINGTON – Motorists are asked to be watchful as they’re driving around town next week. Workers will be at various locations around the community completing the annual filling of cracks in the streets of Torrington.
Mark Weis, project manager for the city of Torrington, said there are 11 locations around the community where workers from Highway Improvements, Inc., of Sioux Falls, S.D., will be working, starting as early as Monday. The project should only take about three days, he said, weather permitting.
“It’s only a couple or three days of work,” Weis said. “They will be out by the end of the week early.”
The areas where workers will be include:
• West 23rd Avenue between Main Street and West E Street
• West 22nd Avenue between West A Street and West C Street
•West 19th Avenue between West C Street and West E Street
• West 17th Avenue between West B Street and West C Street
• West 15th Avenue between Hwy. 85 and Harley Mark Lane
• West 14th Avenue between Hwy. 85 and West D Street
• West C Street between West 14th Avenue and Hwy. 26/85
• West D Street between West 14th Avenue and West 15th Avenue
• Haines Street between West 14th Avenue and Curtis Lane
• West A Street between West 14th Avenue and West 15th Avenue.
“We’re asking people who live along these streets to move their vehicles into the driveway or into their garage,” Weis said. “If they see construction on their street, maybe move (vehicles) around the corner to help speed up the construction and give us a little better finished product.”
Late winter or early spring is the best time to complete a crack-filling project, he said. When the weather is cooler, the road surface contracts and opens the cracks up just that much wider to allow better penetration by the tar filler material.
Workers will be filling cracks on one lane at a time, so there should be minimal disruption in traffic flow. The tar material used can be safely driven over within a few minutes of being applied, Weis said. Workers will block off around the specific area and allow traffic to flow in the opposite lane.
The final cost of the project is about $30,000, Weis said. Each year, the city budgets $37,500 for crack fill in the late winter/early spring time frame. This year, bids came in well below that budgeted amount, and less than a similar project last year, he said.
Each year, the city contracts for a set amount of crack fill work. This year, the project encompasses about 51,850 linear feet of Torrington city streets. The streets in the crack fill project will be resurfaced with chip-seal – a mixture of small rock, laid down over a thin coating of protective asphalt sealant – in late summer or early fall, part of the regular rotation of street maintenance in the community.
