Randy Green lives in a modest, tree-shaded house in the 600 block of C Street NE. Green’s block dead-ends in a large field that stretches south toward the 5th Avenue viaduct. The 700 block of that same street, which is north of 7th Avenue NE, runs less than 100 yards before it abruptly stops.
It’s a quiet neighborhood, especially since there are so few residents. The street is like many others in Ardmore except for one feature — it has never been paved.
But Green isn’t complaining. Traffic is minimal, and his block is so short nobody drives fast enough to stir up choking clouds of dust.
“Dust is not a problem,” he said. “I’m very seldom here and when I do get home from work, I usually sleep.”
Ardmore Street Superintendent Don Olive estimated there are less than 10 gravel streets in the city and they typically have few residents and are lightly traveled. Some of the streets, like Timber Line Lane and Graves Road near Rose Hill Cemetery, don’t have any houses on them at all.
“We treat them the same as our streets that have hard surfaces,” he said. “We blade them. We try to stay on top of them and keep the potholes out of them.”
City Engineer Wayne Busma said some of the gravel roadways inside the city limits are not actually city streets, and city employees can’t work on private property.
“Some of the areas have never been platted and don’t have city easements,” he said. “Some were developed as private roads or private drives. It has been our policy that if it is not a dedicated city street and if we don’t have the right-of-way, we aren’t going to maintain it.”
Busma said the city spends approximately $2 million a year resurfacing city streets, primarily those streets that are badly deteriorated or have completely failed. He said city officials also consider the condition of the underground water and sewer lines in an area when establishing resurfacing priorities. There is also a cost/benefit consideration since street maintenance and resurfacing costs have risen along with everything else. But that doesn’t necessarily mean the city’s remaining gravel roadways will never get paved.
“We were planning to pave a block just off of Monroe Avenue last year, and we would like to pave Graves Road at some point,” Busma said.
Steve Biehn, 221-6546
steve.biehn@ardmoreite.com
