Colorado Springs addressing cracked street problem
Work crews in Colorado Springs started repairs Monday night on one of the city’s busiest — and bumpiest — street sections.
Crews will seal cracks on two sections of South Academy Boulevard between Airport Road and Fountain Boulevard, and between Chelton and Drennan roads.
“The crack filling keeps water out and stretches the life of the road,” said Corey Farkas, manager of the city’s Streets Division. “It won’t make the road smoother but it should last until we can do more work on it.”
The work is expected to take a week to complete and will involve lane closures in both directions.
South Academy is one of three major city roads that are scheduled to be rebuilt during the next several years because they have deteriorated past the point of normal paving work.
Meanwhile, Farkas said the city is stumped by a worse cracking problem in the Soaring Eagles neighborhood near the airport.
Neighbors said they’re frustrated by street cracks several inches wide — wide enough for vegetation to grow in them.
Farkas said the city has similar issues with subdivisions on the east side of town that were built in the 1990s before the city tightened residential construction standards.
Paving the cracks hasn’t worked, Farkas said, so the city has created a test strip on a block of Tail Spin Drive.
“We installed a layer of fiberglass material under the asphalt,” he said. “We’re hoping that gives it strength to hold the asphalt in place and resist cracking.”
However, Farkas said the test must last a year, allowing the strip to endure a full cycle of freezing and thawing weather.
“We’ve done more tests in Soaring Eagles than anywhere else,” he said. “Next, we’ll do some testing in Springs Ranch on the northeast side.”
Joseph Addison has lived in the neighborhood for three years.
“I think they probably should have done the test on one of the major roads — since that’s where most of the traffic is — instead of one of the neighborhood roads,” he said. “Sometimes, I think the amount of traffic on a road has something to do with it.”
In a related matter, the city announced Monday that its crews have repaired 38,826 potholes so far this year. Eight daily crews continue to fill potholes in the city.
