LYNN — City councilors are not happy with how streets are being maintained while numerous trenching projects are happening around the city.
There was a lively discussion at Tuesday’s council meeting, hitting on the topics of steel plates covering trenches, repaving trenched areas, and the storage of project supplies.
Council President John Walsh called it a “cumulative problem” and pointed out that the city has specific guidelines for trenching projects.
“In your professional opinion, do you think anyone is adhering to this manual today?” Walsh asked DPW Commissioner Andrew Hall.
“We could be doing a better job,” Hall responded, adding that he does not have the staff to enforce all of the guidelines on all of the projects.
Walsh brought up the issue of steel plates being used to cover trenches when they are not being actively worked on.
“There are street plates all over the place throughout West Lynn,” he said. “Some of them are active dig sites. They’re cordoned off. We get that. There’s some just floating around out there.”
He said that the city’s guidelines require the plates to be flush with the road.
Marco Gioso, of P. Gioso & Sons, responded that milling and cutting such a wide area around the trench to fit a steel plate is difficult.
“It would not be efficient or beneficial to anybody to do that on a daily basis,” Gioso said, adding that a steel plate is one inch thick. “We try to keep the plates out of the travel lanes if we can.”
City Solicitor James Lamanna said that the law requires plates to be secured.
Walsh brought up a specific plate on Summer Street that was not secure.
“These plates are walking; they move,” he said. “They’re not being put in right.”
Ward 1 Councilor Wayne Lozzi asked if it were possible to backfill the trenches each night.
Gioso responded that they are working with large trenches and that it would be impractical to fill the trenches every night and dig them back up each morning.
Ward 4 Councilor Richard Colucci raised concerns that streets were not being properly repaved when the trench work was completed.
He pointed out that the streets were never properly repaved after a project in The Highlands where gas service lines were replaced two years ago.
“It’s a mess. The streets were in pretty good shape,” Colucci said. “Now, it’s like a roller coaster. It’s not good for the people that live there or the people that drive through the city.”
Ward 6 Councilor Frederick Hogan said he had concerns that his ward would have the same issues following a major combined sewer overflow project that is underway.
“I’ve got people that are really pissed off that their streets are all getting torn up, and they’re not going to be repaved,” Hogan said. “I don’t want to be like Councilor Colucci in The Highlands come two years from now, and I’m telling people the streets are going to get repaired.”
Lozzi said that he has seen a decline in responsiveness from National Grid in the past year regarding repaving following their projects.
“We’ve started a new paving program that’s just getting started and up to speed,” National Grid representative Paul McGrath said, acknowledging that it has caused some delays and frustrations.
Another issue raised was the storage of project materials at night.
Walsh said that piping had been stored on the side of the street overnight while a project was going on near the Post Office and that trucks stored on Bennett Street needed to be moved.
“We’re not going to store materials in the street,” Walsh said. “We’re not going to store piping off to the side of the road. It’s in the manual. It’s not allowed.”
Gioso said that finding lots in the city that can be used as temporary construction yards is difficult, but his project manager recently put together staging plans for the projects in the city.
Councilor-at-Large Brian LaPierre said the issues are a result of a lack of communication.
“People to have the confidence that we do have a system in place, that we know what the hell we’re doing out on the streets, that we’re not doing this willy-nilly,” LaPierre said. “You have experienced people here. We’re not going to tolerate C or D work when it’s A+ price tag that our ratepayers are footing the bill for.”
