Stimulus funds repave smooth road making it even smoother

By Ariel Hart and Kristi E. Swartz

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Rebecca Serna couldn’t quite believe it when she heard road crews would tear up part of Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard for a re-paving project.

While her bicycle tires do prefer smooth new road, it’s just that the work had already been done, she said.

Near as she could tell, the state’s contractor crews, courtesy of the federal stimulus, were paving a couple of blocks that the city of Atlanta had already re-paved. As head of a bicycle advocacy organization, she was peeved the money hadn’t been spent on bicycle lanes instead.

So did tax money fund the same work twice?

The two-block stretch, a part of Ralph David Abernathy that falls between Lee Street and Joseph Lowery Boulevard, was completely re-paved “curb to curb” following sewer work that ended in 2007, said Janet Ward, a city spokeswoman. Since then, it seemed to have held up fine, Serna said.

This summer, state contractor crews tore it up again as part of a larger project. The two blocks happen to be included in a 1.1 mile project on Ralph David Abernathy that the Georgia Department of Transportation re-paved with $490,784 in federal stimulus money, between Cascade Avenue and West Whitehall Street.

The city’s work on Abernathy was a huge “open-cut” job that required a complete re-paving, Ward said.

DOT and its contractor called the city’s work a patch. “Theirs is a band-aid,” said DOT spokesman Mark McKinnon. “The paving the city did was patching based on utility work.”

Otherwise, they would have told GDOT, he said.

“The city has to let us know if they’ve paved the whole thing,” he said.

Ward responded that the city obtained all necessary DOT permits, and DOT was informed.

It’s unclear exactly how much the two-block stretch contributed to the state’s project price, but it’s probably about the same portion financially as the portion of the road length, said Butch Thompson, owner of the contracting company that did the state project, Butch Thompson Enterprises. That would be about $88,000.

But Thompson and DOT said they didn’t waste taxpayer money.

Thompson said he believed his paving dug deeper and was more thorough than the city’s. If he had skipped that section, it would look and feel like it was done in sections, Thompson said. “While at some times it may seem unnecessary, it has a lot to do with the quality of what’s there,” he said.

Serna, who said bicycles are extra sensitive to road quality, said the city’s first paving was smooth enough and a huge relief. She agreed the second paving was even better.

“It’s pretty much the smoothest ride in town right now,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s necessary, but it’s nice.”

Paving durability varies, but in general it lasts for about a dozen years. Abernathy was last fully repaved in 1997, McKinnon said.

How we got the story

People who travel on Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard notified the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that it was being torn up for re-paving after having already been recently re-paved. Interviewing city and state officials, reporters verified that two blocks of a 1.1-mile stimulus paving project had been re-paved by the city following sewer work. Officials with the state and the contractor spoke to possible differences in the two jobs.