There is an article regarding the colored concrete on the front page of The Citizen today.
Failed Concrete: City at Crossroads for Solution
By Loretta B. Harding,
Contributing Writer
The Centerville City Council is trying to solve the mystery of damaged colored concrete pavement panels at the intersection of Main Street (CSAH 14) and Centerville Road. Earlier this month, members of the Public Works Department noticed damaged joints on the colored concrete installed downtown in the summer of 2008 as part of Anoka County’s Main Street Reconstruction Project.
Link Full Story Here.
Previous news account on the history of the additional $517,000 past council approved for street-scaping. Colored concrete, decorative lights...
Link Here
Additional Engineering fees in excess of $72,000 associated with "overseeing" County workers complete construction on COUNTY ROAD 14.
Link Here
Further inspection and fee discussions.
Link Here
Controversial resolution.
Link Here
Please note that previous council voted to add the colored concrete on County 14. They debated the five different colors during the 7/23/2008 session. Jeff Paar is quoted in the approved minutes stating "The color draws attention to the crosswalk". Statz, Bonestroo engineer stated "The color coming into the downtown area makes traffic calmer and drivers aware they are coming into a downtown area." A fair amount of time (15-20 minutes) was spent viewing concrete samples and debating the various shades of color to be chosen.
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5 comments:
More than just concrete is broken in this city. We let council member D. Love tell us when he was running for council that he was all about watching the tax payers monies and yet one of his first votes was to pass the matching funds for the bike paths and parks. Council member Paar and Fehrenbacher are still spending our tax payer dollars on wants instead of needs. The council under the past administrations put us into this financial hole with the likes of colored concrete that we paid the City Engineer to design and now we are to pay them more to study. We paid you over 72,000 dollars to watch them install the concrete the first time and you say it maybe that you let them drive over it with heavy trucks during the construction. Thank you Mayor Capra, council members Lee, Parr, Vickers, among others is this the vision you had for the city millions of dollars of debt. We have multiple numbers of property the city owns that sit not collecting taxes on and yet they needed more because it was to good to pass up. The city correct me if i'm wrong has 11 full time employees for a city of approx. 2.5miles of roads and less that 4000 citizens counting men woman and children. If you look at our budget we are spending more than the city is taking in. The engineering firm working for this city is robing us blind. With the monies that are paid to Bonestroo we could hire our own city engineer and save hundreds of thousands of dollars. Oh ya that would mean another city worker. No I have it get rid of the City Public Works Director the best hire I think that has been made is the new person in charge of roads put him in charge i'm sure that it would be a cost savings for the city. Already I have seen more patching done this winter than in my 20+ years here. With a new mayor and council member I hope this city can be turned around and the City Administrator, Attorney, and Engineer can work for the city council in stead of the council working for them and they all are to represent the taxpayers best interests.
Like the lights on main street wouldn't make you aware you are coming into a downtown area. My husband and I laugh at this. The street is lit up better than a landing strip at the MSP airport!
The city officials should be doing something to make traffic "calmer" on the other side of town where those poor people lost half their front yards along 14. The cars scream past those houses trying to beat each other at the 45 mph merge. TOTALLY unsafe! Council should be addressing issues like this instead of playing decorator with the taxpayers dollar.
Hopefully the new mayor can address this issue before someone is seriously injured or killed.
It's true. I've almost been hit MANY TIMES trying to merge at the lights. In my opinion, it is ridiculous that the speed limit is 45 just mere feet from private homes but the speed limit is 30 all around the lakes where there are no homes.
DO THE DAMN SPEED STUDY and let the chips fall where they may. It is possible that the limit will be raised around the lakes but not in front of the homes on main street. Follow 14 through Lino Lakes and you will not see such a high rate of speed so close to homes all the way to anoka.
It is disgraceful that this has not already been done. Too busy building empires and chasing dreams, I guess.
A speed study was approved last year:
http://www.presspubs.com/articles/2010/04/21/quad_community_press/news/doc4bcce2afc9de8793181441.txt
I believe we could cut cost at facilities management. I see trucks going down dead end streets as many as 3-4 times a day. Sometimes, two trucks one after the other. I think they need to log in and out of their trips, then monitor them and see where they can save time and money (gas prices). Two workers each driving a truck going to the same destination seems unnecessary. Is it because they can't ride together because they don't get along?
Another question is how much is Glaser making off all the lawsuits going on? I imagine his pockets for are full to the brim.
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