The City of Indianola is exploring ways to save money on infrastructure repair, but still extend the life of city roads and better the quality of life for Indianola residents. City Manager Ryan Waller tells KNIA News Public Works Director Akhilesh Pal gave a presentation to the city council about some new construction procedures that can help the city plan infrastructure improvements.
‘The council gave us the green light to explore a process called grind and overlay. It’s not something that can be used for every road but it’s something that is worth exploring. An example that was used, in order to restructure a street that is in fair condition would cost approximately $2 million. With the grind and overlay, it would cost about $700,000 and extend the life about 20 years but at a fraction of the cost.”
The Indianola City Council met in a special study session in their final meeting of 2020 last week, discussing city procedures and looking ahead to budget planning for 2021. City Manager Ryan Waller tells KNIA News one of the ways the council is prepared to look forward is the Pavement Indexing Project. Waller said the project has been spread out over a long time, and is now providing the council with detailed data on city roads and repair.
“We know the data now, we know what roads are good, what roads are bad, and what roads are fair. We wanted to get some direction from council on what the city would like to pursue in order to maintain our infrastructure but at a fraction of the cost.”
The Indianola City Council held a study session at their last meeting of 2020, preparing for programs and budget work for 2021. City Manager Ryan Waller tells KNIA News the council received a presentation from Public Works Director Akhilesh Pal, about making uniform sets of equipment and features for Indianola when looking to plan for future projects.
“The council was presented with a form of uniform standards that most communities around the state have adopted. An example is how a pipe is buried when a road is constructed, the different specifications for that, it helps with creating uniformity for maintenance and customer service. The city does not currently have that, so kudos to the staff for putting this together. Identifying things that are the Indianola way, what kind of manholes, water mains, and things that are specific so we have a uniform set. So if a development goes in, we have specifications to look for in infrastructure and things like that.”
The Indianola City Council approved the hiring of an architect at their meeting Monday, to work with city staff to provide more information on new city facilities. City Manager Ryan Waller tells KNIA News the city is in need of new or updated facilities to better serve Indianola residents.
“Our facilities are outdated. There would be some substantial investment needed in facilities that are not big enough to provide the necessary space for what we have, let alone what we need. So hiring this architect helps us get to the next level, having better detailed plans and being able to have really productive conversations with the community on the next steps.”
The Indianola City Council gave direction to city staff to not back charge Indianola residents for a sewer billing rate change from IMU at their meeting Monday, totaling over $18,000. City Manager Ryan Waller tells KNIA News in September, it was discovered that IMU was not correctly billing customers for a sewer rate increase, and after council directed staff to look into the issue, the recommendation came to not charge residents for the error. Waller also said the billing error came for commercial properties, and the individual impact would be minimal, but the sewer fund was stable enough to not go back and charge the missing amount. For more information, tune in to today’s Let’s Talk Indianola.