Rio Grande Street repaving delayed by unexpected base issues
Scott Harrison
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) — Within the past week, crews have finally repaved the mile-long west end of Rio Grande Street on the city’s southwest side.
However, it has created mixed feelings among drivers, neighbors, and viewers who contacted KRDO 13’s The Road Warrior, who ask why the new asphalt layer wasn’t laid until nearly two months after work began in mid-April.
According to Corey Farkas, the city’s manager for operations and maintenance, crews discovered that the existing base under the old pavement sank after the pavement was removed.
“It might have been groundwater under there,” he said. “We do have ground-penetrating radar in that process. That tells us the approximate thickness of the pavement, but it does not go deep enough to tell us what is under the ground, what the subgrade should look like. We knew the base was an issue there, but sometimes we’re not sure what we’re getting into until we actually start digging.”
Farkas explained that the street needed a more time-consuming and more expensive full rebuild, instead of a routine repaving.
“It means digging up the old base, hauling it away, replacing it with better material, and then repaving,” he said. “Another option is a less-expensive chemical process, but it doesn’t work in every situation.”
Many citizens don’t understand why a street needing a full rebuild may take longer to fix than the average repaving job.
The city hopes to finish all work on Rio Grande by the end of the month; Farkas added that recent rainy weather also slowed progress on the street.
As if all of this weren’t enough, neighborhood streets connecting to Rio Grande are having fiber optic cable installed underneath.
Rio Grande is a well-traveled route between 8th Street, 21st Street, and Cresta Road, and is used by many drivers to reach the popular Bear Creek Dog Park and the Gold Hill Mesa subdivision.
Farkas said that a similar full rebuild will start soon on the west end of Costilla Street, just off 8th Street.