​By Anne Aurand
 
The Bend City Council authorized about $5 million for street preservation work in Bend this summer.
 
This included a $4.7 million agreement with Knife River Corporation that will improve 47 lane miles with grind-and-inlay and overlay treatments. This will include work on some high-use streets including Third Street between Wilson Avenue and Badger Road, Mount Washington between Shevlin Park Road and Chandler Avenue and some areas of downtown that weren’t treated last summer. Much of this work will occur at night to minimize disruptions to the public.
 
The Council also approved a $334,334 contract with Intermountain Slurry Seal, Inc. for slurry seal treatments on about 34 lane miles around the City.
 
The attached map shows a variety of types of treatments that will occur on Bend roads. The City’s “Keep Good Roads Good” philosophy means we maintain and preserve streets with the most cost-effective treatment for the road condition — the right treatment at the right time. Treatments include:
 

• Inlays and Overlays – Old asphalt is ground out and replaced or a new layer of asphalt is paved on top of existing roadway. The process can take a couple of days.
• Slurry – A treatment for low-volume residential streets. One-day closures typically expected.
• Chipseals – Hot oil and rock are applied to the road. Rolling, short term closures expected.

 
A road’s conditions help the City determine maintenance plans. Arterial and collector streets are highest priority. Street preservation treatments can include chip seal, slurry seal, grind-and-inlay or overlay treatments, depending on the severity of the road degradation. The worst roads need full reconstruction. Reconstruction is exponentially more expensive than maintenance, not an efficient use of maintenance funds and more likely to be paid for as part of a larger Capital Improvement Program.