2012 Marks Biggest Eagan Road Construction Season in 23 Years

Expect more than the usual amount of detours and traffic delays in Eagan this summer.

In an average year, the city takes on seven road construction projects covering eight miles of road. But this spring and summer, city crews will tackle 22 projects covering 21.3 miles of road.

The projects may cost as much as $6.5 million—$2 million of which may be assessed to property owners in the city, according to Eagan Public Works Director Thomas Colbert. More than 1,600 property owners in the city will likely receive assessments this year, Colbert said. To see a street map identifying planned road construction projects in Eagan, click on the PDF files attached to this article.

This year is the largest year in terms of road maintenance projects that the city has seen in the 23-year history of the city's Pavement Management System, and city officials have the natural aging of Eagan's 240-mile road network to thank. Many of the streets built in the mid-1980s and early 1990s—when the community was experiencing explosive growth—are now due for resurfacing, Colbert said.

The natural lifespan of a city street is 20-25 years, but routine maintenance can extend that to 60-plus years, Colbert said. Here is the city's maintenance cycle, broken down:

• 3-4 Years after the original construction of the road, city crews will seal cracks that appear in the bituminous pavement and coat the road in a chip seal coat—a layer of bitumen and crushed rock that fills tiny voids in the street and extends the life of the street surface.
• 11-14 years after the original construction of the road, the city repeats the crack sealing and chip seal coating process.
• 20-25 years after the original construction of the road, the city's Public Works department will mill and overlay the road surface. Street workers grind the top layer of pavement off the road and lay a new bituminous surface down.
• 40-45 years after the original construction of the road, city crews will undertake another mill and overlay of the road's surface. Crack sealing and chip seal coating continue at regular intervals.
• 60+ years after the original construction of the road, the city will complete a structural overlay—a complete reconstruction of a city street from the foundation up. To see a graph illustrating the lifetime of a road, click on the PDF files attached to this article.

The city evaluates the surface condition of one-third of its streets every year, which means the entire network is evaluated every three years, Colbert said. Inspectors look for certain kinds of cracking that indicate the health of the road, and run that and other factors through a computer program that generates a ranking on a scale of 0-100 for the road. Roads that score between 35-55 on the scale are good candidates for a mill and overlay, Colbert said.

For mill and overlay projects, Eagan property owners are assessed for 50 percent of the cost of the project. The remaining 50 percent of the cost is borne by the city. In Eagan, property owners aren't responsible for the cost to repair concrete gutters or replace street signs, Colbert said.

The Eagan City Council has already approved a handful of road construction projects this year, including five road projects affecting the neighborhoods of Chatterton Ponds, Stonebridge, Hawthorne Woods, Northview Park Road and Lexington Park neighborhoods. At its next meeting, the council is expected to approve six more construction projects, Colbert said.