The Chainlink

Utility company street patching destroying bike routes

Has anyone else noticed the new style of rough, hard, concrete patching that is being done and apparently accepted by the City of Chicago, often obliterating existing bike routes.

Clark St. between Howard and Devon used to be a prime commuting route for me.  In spite of many lights, they were well synchronized and you could make really good time on that part of the commute.  Not so good in the evening but a great morning route.

That was until last year when some utilty tore up the street right in the bike lane and replaced it not with asphalt, but with this hard concrete.  The crew that did the patch made not the slightest attempt to smooth their work out and now Clark is basically unrideable.

Now another bike lane that was part of my commute, Pratt Blvd., has gotten the same treatment.

So while the city, to great fanfare, introduces new protected bike lanes in some part of the city, they fail to enforce basic street-paving standards and lose bike lanes that have served us well for years.

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Permalink Reply by Eli on May 21, 2013 at 9:46am

They will finish up the resurfacing this summer and next summer when they do the larger project of the road diet;hence saving some tax money by not resurfacing twice. 

Frankly it seems like waiting over a year while the street surface is in a basically unusable state, simply to prevent having to do it twice, should not be acceptable. If it was a matter of a month, I could understand waiting. But if it's not going to be done until next summer? Surely there is some way that a less expensive, temporary, less resilient, but usable surface could be installed to tide us over until then.

Permalink Reply by David 4.0 on May 21, 2013 at 9:59am

31st street from the lakefront over to Indiana is also being destroyed by construstion work.

Permalink Reply by Tony Adams on May 21, 2013 at 10:00am

A year! yikes! I've mentioned in an earlier thread that 35th street between Archer and Damen got this treatment earlier this year. It was torn up for a couple of weeks, then patched with really bad concrete for a few weeks and then the whole stretch got a nice new layer of asphalt. So at least in this one case it worked as per the plan.

Steve Cohen said:

That's originally what I thought, but Clark has been that way for close to a year now.  I don't know about the longevity of all these stretches that others have mentioned.  And as h' correctly stated, this concrete is at the top layer.  I imagine it would be hard on the asphalt-scraping machines that they use when repaving a street.  It doesn't appear obvious to me that over-coating with an asphalt layer is in the plans.

Duppie 13.5185km said:

B. It's understood that these concrete patches are not the permanent pavement, right? I agree that it often takes longer than one would think is necessary, but ultimately they are all getting repaved with fresh asphalt.

Just sayin'

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on May 21, 2013 at 10:20am

Arrggghhh!!!!!

David 4.0 said:

31st street from the lakefront over to Indiana is also being destroyed by construstion work.

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on May 21, 2013 at 10:22am

Yep, and that was torn up almost a year ago. That project had the added bonus of LOTS of steel plates, one of which was not big enough to cover the hole. Had to bug CDOT about that one a few times until they got a crew out to properly cover it and eliminate the nasty wheel trap they'd created in the middle of the righthand southbound lane.

Tricolor said:

Forgot to add there's also a rough concrete trench on State Street between Washington and Madison, right in the center of the southbound lanes.

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on May 21, 2013 at 10:26am

Artistically rustic concrete treatment...

That's a very euphemistic way of putting it. ;)

...Rahm was pitting subcontractors against city crews...

Charming.


Wells north of Chicago has been a washboard-like mess for about a year, too. I heard from CDOT that it's supposed to get properly resurfaced this year.  I know that a lot of people will welcome that positive change.

Permalink Reply by Rich S on May 21, 2013 at 10:28am

I gave up on Wells months ago! I'll take either Clark, Kingsbury, or Larrabee now.  

Tricolor said:

This is what pretty much ruined Wells.  There's a long trench along Sheridan just before Loyola I avoid when I'm driving, too.

Permalink Reply by Davo on May 21, 2013 at 10:49am

FWIW a friend explained why these stretches are left "grooved"

1. The concrete and asphalt is laid by 2 different crews. Some weird city ordinance states that any sort of road work that goes over a "10 hr" period of time needs to have another crew/business come to finish it. So the city or utility company has to fill the hole but the finished work goes conveniently over this "10 hr limit" so another contractor has to finish it.

2. Asphalt needs certain conditions for it to be applied properly. This doesn't explain why some stretches have been like this for over a year now though.

3. I have heard that concrete, in many ways, is cheeper and better than asphalt. But asphalt looks "prettier" so we go with that instead.

This is all third hand info though so take from it what you will.

Permalink Reply by Crazy David 84 Furlongs on May 21, 2013 at 11:17am

That's being paved as I write.   They are in the middle of Southport repaving today.   Today they are at Grace....

Will G - 10mi said:

I've actually reached out in writing to CDOT on 3 separate occasions about this, specifically Southport going north between Addison and Irving Park. They have completely blown me off.

ATA? Help? You guys and gals seem to be good at getting people's attention.

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on May 21, 2013 at 11:31am

Right. It excuses not being able to pave in winter, not leaving rough concrete for a year or more.  Concrete pours may be more durable than asphalt. The problem is the gaps between the pours - much tougher to patch effectively when enough freeze-thaw cycles have done a number on those gaps.

To give an example, a short stretch of 93rd St. in Beverly was paved in concrete years ago. Nice when it was new, not so nice in recent years when some of the gaps had grown to 6-12" - patched ineffectively with asphalt. Those asphalt patches would always crater out within 6 months or less, leaving even bigger gaps vulnerable to the next round of freeze-thaw cycles. Last year, after many many requests, the alderman finally had that section repaved in asphalt.

Davo said: ....

2. Asphalt needs certain conditions for it to be applied properly. This doesn't explain why some stretches have been like this for over a year now though.

3. I have heard that concrete, in many ways, is cheeper and better than asphalt. But asphalt looks "prettier" so we go with that instead.

This is all third hand info though so take from it what you will.

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on May 21, 2013 at 11:31am

Thanks for sharing the great news about Southport.

David crZven 10.6 said:

That's being paved as I write.   They are in the middle of Southport repaving today.   Today they are at Grace.....

Permalink Reply by Steve Cohen on May 21, 2013 at 11:37am

ATA - it's hard (impossible, I think) for a mere member to raise a discussion there.  That's why I joined this group yesterday.  I'd love to hear their take on it.  They might even actually be able to find out something.

Will G - 10mi said:

I've actually reached out in writing to CDOT on 3 separate occasions about this, specifically Southport going north between Addison and Irving Park. They have completely blown me off.

ATA? Help? You guys and gals seem to be good at getting people's attention.

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