WEST BEND — The city announced on Tuesday that it will receive federal funding, in the amount of $1.25 million, for the resurfacing of Paradise Drive from Main Street to the Eisenbahn Trail through the Surface Transportation Program-Urban that is administered by the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.
Through the STP-U program, 80% of the resurfacing cost will be covered by federal funds, with West Bend covering the remaining 20% of project costs. According to a news release, of the $1.25 million in federal funding, $91,084 will go toward the design phase of the project and $1,158,917 will go to the construction phase of the project.
Here is the route that this is about:
0.6 miles. Roughly 1,000 feet. Ten football fields. $1.56 MILLION to just resurface it. Let’s start with that. That’s expensive. Why is it so expensive? Yes, asphalt is petroleum-based and the cost of materials is high. But we’re not talking any underground work or changes. It’s just resurfacing. That’s $1,500 per YARD of road.
And what is this?
$91,084 will go toward the design phase of the project
That’s just the federal contribution, so over $100k to design… what? It’s resurfacing an existing road. What the hell are they designing? Who is being paid to design it? The city has a city engineer on staff. What the hell is he doing?
Furthermore, why are our federal dollars going to this at all? Why is it the interest of taxpayers in any other town or state in our nation to resurface half a mile of a local road in West Bend, Wisconsin? There is an insane amount of filtering that that money goes through before getting to the project and it comes with all sorts of strings. It’s an incredible amount of waste and not the role of the federal government or the national taxpayers.
Then, the cherry…
“We are excited about the approval of this federal funding,” City Engineer Max Marechal said in the release. “This funding is crucial for improving our city roads. We thank WisDOT for their support and look forward to starting construction in 2028.”
2028!?!? FOUR YEARS FROM NOW!?!? TO START!?!?
If you want a perfect example of how dysfunctional and wasteful our government is, I give you the resurfacing project for a half-mile stretch of road in West Bend, frickin’ Wisconsin.
So with an estimated 112,362 miles in WI, just to repave the State’s roads would cost approximately $296,635,680,000. This does not include any repair, just the re-paving…
For the country it would be around 11,008,800,000,000…but we can look at the bright side! Probably 30-40% doesn’t really need it so we can take about 35% right off the top, assuming no road re-construction is needed anywhere and $1500/yard won’t increase too much in the States with more corruption and just higher pay rates.
West Bend can always follow Milwaukee’s example and just let their roads deteriorate to foot trails.
Nah, Merlin. MKE roads are going to be featured in Jeep off-roading commercials.
They need all of that design money so they can add all of those roundabouts, bike lanes, traffic calming measures, and pedestrian friendly measures. When they are done it will be faster to walk that distance than it will to drive.
Owen, Did you mistype?
0.6 miles. Roughly 1,000 feet.
0.6 miles is 3168 feet.
Ten football fields.
3000 feet (not including end zones). Now add 168 feet more, or another 1/2+ football field.
That’s $1,500 per YARD of road.
Well, yeah, if you’re only thinking in kite-string linear mode that sounds insane. But they are, basically, doing “flooring”; it’s square yard(s).
That section of Paradise Drive looks to be about 35′ wide, not including the extra turn lanes at the intersection of Main or any apron work needed on the side streets.
The total would be about $14.07 per SqFt, or $126.63 per SqYd. Or $1500 per 35 SqYrds. Less than that when you do include the turn lanes/aprons.
If we knew the depth needed, one could actually come up with the cost per cubic yard. (For those of you in Rio Linda, a “yard” in construction or landscape talk = a cubic yard)
Since there are concrete curbs with aprons I would guess this isn’t going to be just a topper. They are going to have to either grind down the asphalt edges and slope up to layer2 (not good for snowplowing) or do a complete tear-out of the old.
Be glad they aren’t doing concrete.