CITY OF PACIFICA
COUNCIL AGENDA SUMMARY REPORT
7/8/2024
1 SUBJECT:
Approve Resolution Authorizing 5-year Street Maintenance Improvements RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Approve a Resolution Authorizing the 5-year Street Maintenance Program Improvements for FY 25/26 to FY 29/30
STAFF CONTACT:
Lisa Petersen, Director of Public Works
(650) 738-3770
[email protected]
BACKGROUND/DISCUSSION:
The City of Pacifica is responsible for maintaining over 90 centerline miles of street pavement.
In order to complete this maintenance, the City has an identified budget every year for annual street maintenance projects as part of the Capital Improvement Program (CIP) and as identified in the City’s 5-year Street Maintenance Program. Since FY 20/21, as part of the City’s 5-year Street Maintenance Program, the City has spent approximately $8M on street maintenance projects. As noted at the October 2020 City Council approval of the program, due to the City’s limited street maintenance funding, other maintenance strategies needed to be employed to slow Pacifica’s pavement decline and not exceed the budget. Pavement best practice of keeping good pavements in good condition by using inexpensive slurry seals (asphalt emulsion and sand mix) was used as well as “caping” old pavements in poor condition to prevent them from degrading further with cape seals (asphalt emulsion, ¼” rock w/slurry).
Previous 5-Year Program and Results
The previously approved 5-year program was put in place to stop the escalating decline of Pacifica’s pavements that were some of the worst in the entire Bay Area. Due to limited pavement maintenance funding, the pavement consultant, NCE Consulting, put in place several strategies that included using low-cost seal treatments to slow the decline of the City’s pavements. Slurry seals were used to keep good streets in good condition and cape seals were used to cap poor streets to keep them from falling into the expensive reconstruction category.
Seal coats typically last between 5-7 years but can last longer. A change that was made to the program after the first year was using cape seals with rubber added on distressed streets in place of regular cape seals. Although rubber cape seals can cost slightly more, they tend to last longer than a regular cape seal, are more effective at sealing cracks and are environmentally friendly as the product utilizes discarded vehicle tires. Rubber cape seals can be sensitive to colder temperatures; however, the seals have performed well even when placed on Pacifica’s colder summer days.
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The previously approved 5-year program cost approximately $1.4M/year, and the City has spent around $8M on pavement work outlined by the program. Some additional streets were added from areas that had not been previously included in the 5- year program when Council added $650k from Measure Y Funds in the FY 24-25 budget. The plan increased Pacifica’s overall pavement from a low Pavement Condition Index (i.e. rating of pavement surface - will be discussed further in the report) of 39 (Poor condition) in 2020 to a Pavement Condition Index (PCI) of 53 (Good condition) in 2024, following the summer 2024 street resurfacing work. This represents a 15-point increase to the City’s overall PCI, showing that the City’s pavements improved under the 5-yr program. Although NCE’s 2020 5-yr program showed the PCI remaining about the same and dropping slightly during the 5 years, completing 2-years of the program in the first summer helped raise the PCI more quickly and it is important to note that a large part of the City’s program has been seal coats due to limited street maintenance funds.
Seal coats generally have a limited life span of 5-7 years and once the seal coat meets the projected life expectancy, the condition of these pavements with seal coats will drop more rapidly in future years, causing lower assessments of these pavements than when the seal coat is first placed. It will be important for the City to identify future funding that will allow for more robust treatments on roadways, such as overlays that will last 20 to 25 years, to maintain a higher PCI. Under this 5-year program, the City resurfaced 43.5% of the City’s roadways in a four year period.
Street Pavement Maintenance Program and StreetSaver Program Key elements of industry standards and best management practices for street maintenance programs are as follows:
1. Use the results of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission’s (MTC) pavement maintenance software, StreetSaver, to obtain a macro or high-level view of street needs (required to receive state and federal funding).
2. Follow the industry standard of maintaining streets that are in good condition to keep them from dropping into more expensive repair categories.
3. Use the preliminary StreetSaver recommendations, along with other factors, to develop the most reasonable and effective pavement maintenance projects.
4. Provide yearly funding with a long-term goal of increasing pavement conditions to optimal level.
The Streetsaver program alone is not sufficient in making project level decisions but is rather one element among several important factors the City uses for consideration of a yearly paving program. Other factors essential in determination of the yearly paving program include:
- Review of street needs with the City’s Engineering/Maintenance Division - In-field pavement consultant engineering determination of the actual street treatments appropriate for the level of street distress and verify need - Determining the risk of a street falling into a costlier repair category - Identifying upcoming utility, development, or CIP projects on a street Pacifica City Council 3
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- Increasing potential cost benefits by selecting streets in proximity to other streets in the project
StreetSaver
StreetSaver is a computer-based pavement management system developed by MTC in 1987. Currently all San Francisco Bay area cities and counties use the StreetSaver software to better maintain their roads and the program is the most highly used pavement software program on the West Coast. StreetSaver helps cities and counties understand the overall condition of their pavement infrastructure and their budgetary needs for maintaining their pavement. The program uses an algorithm that includes budget, street condition and pavement treatments (identified in the program) to create a list of yearly pavement maintenance projects. These projects represent the most cost-effective use of the pavement budget to keep the overall City pavement condition as high as possible. Most federal and local grants for pavement rehabilitation projects require applicants to be actively using a pavement management program to be eligible for these grants to ensure the funding is being used to its best benefit.
The StreetSaver program tracks streets by their associated Pavement Condition Index (PCI), which identifies the condition of the street. At a high level, streets are categorized by condition on a 100 point scale:
Rating Condition
70-100 Very Good
50-70 Good
25-50 Poor
0-25 Very Poor
Base street conditions are collected through visual assessments every two to three years for all streets and the data is utilized to update the StreetSaver database. This work is typically completed through a grant in the form of consultant help from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) every 2 to 3 years and is a “snapshot in time” of the condition of the pavements at the time of assessment and each street section is given a PCI number. The PCI ratings are on a score of 0 to 100. After inputting this PCI score in StreetSaver, the program tracks the score and based on multiple criteria, including traffic levels and current condition, adjusts the condition rating of streets over time through an algorithm and identifies candidate streets for maintenance treatments. Accurate pavement condition assessments are important for the budget prioritization process for the City’s street maintenance program and for StreetSaver to optimize funding to achieve the highest feasible overall PCI rating for a street network.
NCE’s New 5-year Pavement Maintenance Program (Attachment 1) The new 5-year program is based on $2.2M/year of maintenance funding from SB1 and Measure W (~ $1.65M) with the remaining funds coming from the City’s vehicle impact/ pavement cut fees and a Recology designated fee. Additionally, it is anticipated that the sewer replacement work will be completed in east Rockaway Beach and Vallemar areas after the summer of 2027. Wastewater staff has calculated the estimated pavement cut fees for both areas at ~$900k and these funds were included separately and specifically allocated to the Rockaway Beach and Vallemar areas. The program street selection was determined using the StreetSaver program and the best industry practices, as discussed earlier in the Pacifica City Council 4
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report. As noted earlier, pavement maintenance funding can only be used for pavement maintenance and assignment of streets receiving funds must be based on an approved pavement maintenance program such as StreetSaver or the City could lose future pavement funding. In addition to using the City’s pavement maintenance program, StreetSaver, the City also used the consultant expertise from pavement engineering firm NCE to develop the City’s 5-year program.
NCE’s newly developed 5-year program uses the same “book end” approach as the previous program due to the continued issue of limited pavement funding in the City. One bookend holds up pavements currently in good condition and keeps them in good condition so they do not fall into more expensive repair categories with slurry seals (the most cost effective way to maintain pavements).The other bookend would target appropriate collector and residential streets in the poor condition categories and provide stopgap measures, such as rubber cape seals, to prevent these streets from falling into reconstructions. Some streets in the poorer condition categories that are considered beyond a seal coat are shown to receive rehabilitation in the form of grinding and placing a new lift of asphalt concrete. Selection of these streets by the program is limited due to the higher cost of rehabilitation that can be 15 times greater or more than placing seal coats.
The new 5-year program will cover ~30% of the City’s street network for a total cost of approximately $12M. Because of the limited funding, the PCI is expected to drop two points from a high of 53 during this 5-year period to a PCI of 51. Following the 5-year period, the City will have resurfaced ~74% of the roads, not including streets that received resurfacing through separate grant funded projects. Although this is a substantial achievement for the City, it still leaves a significant number of streets without treatment and the current cost estimate to treat streets not included in the program is around $19M. Many of these streets are in poor condition with almost half of these roads at a PCI of 10 or lower. This is because the “fix the worst first” strategy for pavement maintenance does not work and pavement maintenance programs will use a limited maintenance budget to choose less expensive seal coats for roadways that allows the program to maintain a greater number of streets and keep the overall PCI of the network high, instead of using the limited funds on expensive roadway reconstruction that can only address a few streets causing the remainder of the street network to drop into worse condition.
A city’s street network typically represents the highest cost worth of city infrastructure.
Maintenance of this infrastructure is critical to prevent increased deferred maintenance costs that can financially impact a city in future years. It will be important for the City to continue to actively look for and identify funding for streets in this more expensive repair category to address these roads that did not receive appropriate pavement maintenance over the years.
It is also critically important for the City to continue moving forward with its yearly street maintenance program to prevent other streets from dropping into the more expensive repair categories, adding to the City’s deferred maintenance costs.
Next Steps
Should the City Council approve the Resolution authorizing the 5-year Street Maintenance Program Improvements, staff will return to Council by the end of August with a consultant agreement to begin design on the first year (summer 2025) street improvement plans. It is important for staff to complete the design by the end of the year to bid the project in early winter. Bidding the project during this time allows the City to receive better contractor bids as contractors escalate bids later in the season when they have already secured enough work Pacifica City Council 5
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for the summer.
The City Manager recommends that the Council approve a Resolution Authorizing the 5-year Street Maintenance Program Improvements for FY 25/26 to FY 29/30.
ALTERNATIVE ACTION:
Council may choose not to approve the Resolution authorizing the 5-year Street Maintenance Program Improvements for FY 25/26 to FY 29/30. However, each year delay for implementing a street maintenance program could significantly decline the overall City PCI. Additionally, the approval will allow staff to begin work towards the design for summer 2025’s street maintenance project and allow early bidding to secure better pricing for the project.
RELATION TO CITY COUNCIL GOALS AND WORK PLAN:
Approval of these actions is consistent with the following Council adopted Goals:
• Improve and Steward City Infrastructure, Streets and Facilities: Approval of this Resolution will improve the City street network.
FISCAL IMPACT:
There is no fiscal impact with this approval. All costs related to the design and construction work for the 5-year Street Maintenance Program will be brought separately to the City Council for approval at future meetings.
ORIGINATED BY:
Public Works
ATTACHMENT LIST:
Attachment 1 - Pacifica_2025 to 2029 Work Plan_Final List and Map (PDF) Pacifica City Council 6
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RESOLUTION NO. _____
A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PACIFICA AUTHORIZING THE 5-YEAR STREET MAINTENANCE PROGRAM IMPROVEMENTS FOR FY 25/26 TO FY 29/30 WHEREAS, in order to prevent the deterioration of the City’s pavement network, the City should complete a 5-year Street Maintenance Program (Program) and complete yearly street maintenance projects in accordance with the Program; and WHEREAS, the 5-year Street Maintenance Program must be based on the City’s current pavement maintenance software, StreetSaver, to prevent loss of state and federal funding; and
WHEREAS, the City previous 5-year Street Maintenance Program is now complete and a new 5-year Street Maintenance Program is needed for FY 25/26 to FY 29/30; and WHEREAS, the 5-year Street Maintenance Program for FY 25/26 and FY 29/30 is based on the StreetSaver program; and
WHEREAS, NCE Consulting, a pavement engineering company, has assisted with development of the 5-year Street Maintenance Program and completed in-field inspections of all of the roadways included in the program.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Pacifica to authorize the 5-year Street Maintenance Program Improvements for FY 25/26 to FY 29/30. • • • • •
PASSED AND ADOPTED at a regular meeting of the City Council of the City of Pacifica, California, held on the 8
th day of July, 2024, by the following vote:
AYES, Councilmembers:
NOES, Councilmembers:
ABSENT, Councilmembers:
ABSTAIN, Councilmembers:
_________________________________
Sue Vaterlaus, Mayor
ATTEST: APPROVED AS TO FORM:
______________________________ _________________________________ Sarah Coffey, City Clerk Michelle Kenyon, City Attorney