There are 1,300 lane-kilometres of road in Prince George subject to deterioration every year based on several factors, including winter weather and spring meltdown.
The city is looking to analyze the conditions of its roads by conducting a second review in the last five years by using a van filled with lasers and cameras to indicate which areas need improvement in the years to come.
Tetra Tech, the company Prince George is partnering with in the assessment, uses, what’s known as, a Pavement Surface Profiler.
It gets driven around a city while collecting data, putting together a comprehensive report of local roads and ultimately producing a ‘condition score’ for each segment.
“The City invests millions of dollars every year in road rehabilitation and this information – along with other factors, such as traffic volumes – is central to determining which roads around the City are in greatest need of re-paving and also allows us to effectively target pothole repair,” says Mick Jones, City of Prince George Supervisor of Streets Operations in a news release.
In 2020 thus far, Prince George has seen $5.7 million pooled in for road rehab projects, which includes more than 40 lane-kilometres of road repaving.
More is expected to take place across various regions in the city and also includes sidewalk upgrades.
The last time Prince George engaged in a similar assessment was in 2016-17, and since then, the city says more than 95 per cent of streets conditioned and classified as ‘poor’ or ‘fair’ have been repaved.
Tetra Tech’s machine is already out on the roads and is expected to complete its assessment later in July.
It’s Profiler has operated almost 1,000,000 km of North American roads.
More information is available on the City of Prince George website.
