The CSD Board of Directors has taken a major step in planning the future of major road projects in Bear Valley Springs.

At the April 9 Regular Board Meeting, Directors were presented with a Pavement Management Report from Infrastructure Management Services (IMS).

To View the Full Pavement Management Report, Click Here

The report takes an in-depth look at the current condition of roads in Bear Valley Springs, using a Pavement Condition Index (PCI). The PCI is essentially the health of the road. Roads are examined for things like pavement cracking, rutting, and roughness. Once that data is collected, it is analyzed to give each segment a PCI score between 0 and 100. The higher the score, the better the condition of the road.

IMS analyzed 95 miles of roads in Bear Valley Springs. They found that our roads have an average PCI of 44, which falls in the “marginal” range. They also found that 46% of our roads are in the “poor” or “very poor” categories, while 23% are rated as “good” or better.

IMS identified three key takeaways from this data:

• The network average pavement condition score falls below the national average currently seen by IMS of 60 to 65, with the Community’s average scoring a 44.
• The number of streets rated Excellent is below the minimum recommended target of 15% at 0%.
• The backlog amount, which is the total of Very Poor and Poor roads (between a PCI of 0 and 40), is far above the maximum recommended target of 12% at 46%.

Simply put, roads in Bear Valley Springs are currently missing all three of these key metrics.

What Comes Next

Currently, the CSD has a roads budget of $0.17 Million per year. This is based on a Roads Assessment that was implemented in 1996 and hasn’t been changed since. Based on the analysis and projections by IMS, leaving that budget unchanged will lead to continued degradation of our roads, dropping Bear Valley’s average PCI from 44 to 34 within five years.

The Pavement Management Report includes several potential budget options with a variety of outcomes.

For example, raising the budget to $2.29 million would only maintain current PCI conditions, while a more substantial investment, around $3.5 million annually, would be needed to begin improving road quality.

In other words, the less the CSD spends, the worse our roads will be. In order to make significant improvements to our roads, the CSD will need a significant increase in the roads budget.

The CSD Board of Directors will use the report’s findings to determine an appropriate level of road funding and how it will be funded. This topic will be discussed at a future board meeting.

To View the Full Pavement Management Report, Click Here