LYNNFIELD — Following last Monday’s election results where funding for a decade long program for road maintenance and repair was voted down, the Lynnfield Department of Public Works has had to shift their more aggressive approach to upgrade Lynnfield roadways.
Nonetheless, DPW Director John Scenna told the Daily Item that his department isn’t straying from their data-based strategies for pavement management and repairing roadways in need.
“We’re gonna stay the course, it’s just gonna take a lot longer to get the final results of the program,” Scenna said. “The actual volume of work clearly is going to decrease as well. We have a lot of faith in the approach we take to determine where to invest and what roads need attention at what time.”
He also attested to the department’s around-the-clock aggressive search for grants to help supplement DPW projects like pavement management, something that would help greatly without the $12.85 million that would’ve been funneled towards this project if voted through.
November’s town meeting that narrowly approved the project funding to appear on last week’s special election ballot featured a presentation from Scenna that outlined the preparation work and study that went into creating the proposed ten-year initiative.
This included data from BETA Engineering consultants that captured every roadway in Lynnfield and categorized their condition as poor, fair, or good. The resulting “Road Surface Rating” for the town came out to 69.70, one of the lowest in the state.
If the town invested in the ten-year plan recommended by this research analysis, this rating would have gone up to 76.18, one of the highest community scores.
Still, the DPW has committed to continue to utilize this highly data-driven approach to evaluate the conditions of roads, understand what is needed, and to work with the town in order to achieve management goals.
“We’ll continue to use that program. We’ll make evaluations every winter based on that program and make a recommendation to the town administrator and select board on where we feel the program should go in any given year,” Scenna said.
The implications of not passing the recommended budget for the pavement management program lies mainly with scale, especially with regards to addressing roads that aren’t poor just yet but still need improvement.
“What could be at stake is work done on moderately poor streets that we could do some work on and extend the life of and not have to address for the next ten or twelve years. I think we’re going to have less capacity to do that type of stuff,” Scenna said.
For now, the DPW will continue to use the BETA Engineering research to guide how they approach roadway projects on a more yearly basis and bring that data-based outcome to the select board.
To find the pavement management program results from last year, visit the DPW section of the newly refurbished Lynnfield website at https://www.lynnfieldma.gov/462/Roadways.
