Get rid of car traps

Ideas on what to do to attract more people that wish to live in Bruderheim

Get rid of car traps

To attract more families — families with children or planning to have children — to come to Bruderheim and settle here, a little extra is required.  As good as Bruderheim looks, it must and can be made to look better. 

Maybe that is what Bruderheim is doing, but one has to wonder.  A few years ago it had been decided to contract the public works department of the County of Strathcona to perform the maintenance work necessary to keep the Town's infrastructure up to par and operational.  The state of repair of all communities in the County of Strathcona is clearly visible to anyone visiting them, and it is impressively good.  It appears that Bruderheim's state and quality of repairs don't measure up to theirs and are substandard. 

The state of our streets makes a big impression on visitors.  Anyone wrecking his car on account of the state of our roads or thinking that he will be better off negotiating our streets with a four-wheel drive is not likely to move here. 

The first photo on this page is of potholes at the east end of Brook side.  The boy on his BMX bike has little trouble negotiating the obstacle course on the road.  However, I noticed that the drivers of the vehicles passing this spot slowed down to about two miles per hour.  That is a smart thing to do, especially considering what meets them a little way down the road.

There is no warning to drivers about accidents waiting to happen when they come around the curve.  This frost heave is a very real and present danger.  Let's hope that the Town considers that, if an accident should happen on account of this frost heave, the lawyer for the claimant is sure to bring up the question of due diligence not having been exercised by the town administration.
   Ultimately it will be the members of Town Council who will be charged.  Certainly, one would hope that the liability insurance covers accident damage claims due to due diligence having been neglected, but will possible claims not cause the insurance rates to go up, and thereby cause an increase in our property taxes?

The problems of this nature appear to have been caused before the road were even paved over.  Apparently the backfilling of the trenches carrying the water lines into serviced properties was not done properly.  For whatever reason, the soil used for backfilling did not get tamped down sufficiently (was there no quality control at the time?).
   The loose soil later settled, causing the sidewalks and pavement at such locations to subside. 
   That caused water to stand in the gutters.  The water seeped through the pavement into the roadbed, where it caused gradually expanding pockets of ice to form.  Every Spring the ice melted and turned the roadbed to mud.
   Some road repairs were done to fix some of the consequences, but the gutters were generally not repaired well enough to facilitate effective water run-off and drainage.  In most locations where repairs were done the sidewalks were not reconstructed, so that the standing water will continue doing its damage.  Obviously that is the case.  It appears that none of the repair jobs withstood the test of time.  In every location where repairs were done the repair jobs themselves deteriorate at varying accelerating rates.

Brookside is not the only place in Bruderheim that experiences such extensive road damage.  The worst place of them all is the West-Woodlands subdivision.  Nevertheless, in the West_Woodlands subdivision there are barriers and orange warning cones (many are tipped over and left in that state for weeks or longer) that warn drivers of such road hazards there.

The pavement of our roads is no more than about 2.5 inches thick (see photo above, on the right, of a piece of pavement from West Woodlands), and the sidewalk concrete no more than 2.5 inches in West Woodlands (instead of the required 3.5 inches that are standard in the older parts of town).  Having water standing on the roads is bad news under such circumstances.
   Still, in addition to having to be careful when they drive on their roads, Brookside residents have to cope with the long-standing unsightly problem of a basement that will never be put to use.

Next Page: The long-standing eyesore of a basement that will never be used

Back to index page for Impressions and Ideas on how to make Bruderheim even better

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Posted 2005 06 10
Updates:
2006 10 29 (reformated)