Town officials last week approved a $35,000 contract with a Burlington, Mass.-based company for a data-collection effort designed to help New Canaan track the condition of its roads and sidewalks.
In addition to updating the “pavement condition index” or ‘PCI’ of 286 local roads, the work from StreetScan Inc. will provide a complete inventory of related “assets” such as road striping, signage, catch basins, manholes, water valves and roadside trees, according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann.
“It’s a fantastic idea to have all of our assets in one place, so all in, we think this an excellent step forward,” Mann told the Board of Selectmen at its Aug. 6 meeting, held at Town Hall.
The three-year contract, at $35,240 annually, represents “municipal pricing” that is lower than what StreetScan had quoted in the past, Mann said. To be used as a planning and budgetary tool, the work will “add another layer” to New Canaan’s GISupdate an initial pavement management study that was done about 15 years ago, he said.
First Selectman Kevin Moynihan and Selectmen Kit Devereaux and Nick Williams voted 3-0 in favor of the contract.
The selectmen asked man whether the collected data would be shared with fire and police (yes), who determines the PCI now (Mann and Mose Saccary of the Department of Public Works), whether funds for the contract are already in this fiscal year’s budget (yes, the pavement budget), how much analysis StreetScan will do (it’ll take two weeks to drive through the town and then another month to import a new GIS system, so a “product” should be ready by mid-November ahead of budget season) and what would happen after three years (the town would pay about $4,000 annually for software maintenance).
Williams said that “maintaining our roads is one of the fundamental jobs the Board of Selectmen has in this town.”
“I think from a safety perspective alone it is good to have,” he said.