The snow has been flying which means that another road construction season is over in Rocky View County (RVC) and officials there are calling this one highly successful.  

In 2018, RVC completed or significantly advanced a total of 23 projects involving $16.59 million in rehabilitation and improvement projects.

County Reeve Greg Boehlke is pleased by the amount of work undertaken by road crews this year.

"In a county as big as ours, we have a lot of roads to maintain so every year we have projects that are either repair work or actual road construction of repaving.  Over the years, and I've been a councillor for quite a while, and over the years the biggest issue I've had to deal with in my division (Division Six) which is primarily agriculture, is the quality of our roads.  We're happy to make moves that make people better able to commute back and forth on.  Our projects basically hit every division of the nine in our county."

The county completed $3.57 million in work on 13 road maintenance and rehab projects involving major surface improvements to maintain and prolong their lifespans.

They also completed important phases of three major road network improvement projects with a total budget of $8.1 million.

Finally, RVC advanced work on seven road improvement projects that began in previous years, investing $4.92 million into them.

Boehlke believes that county residents are noticing the improvements in the roads, saying, "Our roads are better and they're getting better every year.  As far as resident input, my phone doesn't ring the way it used to, put it that way.  It's actually appreciated when we get calls or emails telling us there issues.  I wouldn't say there's a lot of angst, it's just that people expect good roads for the taxes they pay."

Now, for the winter months, the attention shifts to snow and ice control and ensuring public safety.  Boehlke is very proud of RVC's plowing and road maintenance that takes place in winter.

"We've got a very, very successful program of how we plow and control roads in the wintertime with storms and whatnot.  That part of it's looked after."  Boehlke says the road work they completed this summer will likely make it easier to maintain them for the winter months.  "Especially the asphalt or harder surface roads for sure.  To plow snow on gravel roads in the winter without removing all the gravel is kind of a technical job.  We rely on the professionalism of our staff to try to save gravel and our guys do a pretty good job of clearing the roads.:

The road program is funded by Alberta's Basic Municipal Transportation Grant, the Federal Gas Tax Fund, and Rocky View County's Community Aggregate Payment Levy and municipal property taxes.

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