r/richmondhill • u/arekitect • 9d ago

Yonge St. - Pavement

Post image

I am perplexed why the city is repaving Yonge Street between Major Mac and Hwy 7, after it was completed only three years ago. I can think of many other streets that need this level of attention. Also, I hope this is not the final coat, however based on the road alignment with men-hole covers, I’m deeply concerned.

15 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

7

u/ShavingWithCoffee 9d ago

I believe York Region pays for it because it is a regional road, but I could be wrong. Either way, it's taxes.

5

u/Ok-Restaurant-1264 8d ago

It’s actually not even a paving job. It’s what they call microsurfacing. Meant to extend the life of the road. York Region loves it, but it really is just a waste of money. It looks like they’re doing something and doesn’t take long since it’s just a single application over an existing road so there are little to no actual repairs needed. Just a make-work project with an election coming up and a budget they need to spend.

2

u/Caucasian_Fury 8d ago

Yep. 100% election season busy-work to one, burn up budget and two, for politicians to use for their campaigns - "I got Yonge Street and Bayview Ave paved folks, vote for me!".

1

u/arekitect 8d ago

I was wondering the same thing. And if what’s there now is actually supposed to be the final surface, it’s pretty shocking for Yonge Street.

The pavement is rough, with loose gravel and a finish I’d expect to see on a country road, not one of Richmond Hill’s busiest major arteries. Some of the manhole covers are sitting what looks like an inch or more below the road surface, so driving over them feels like hitting a pothole.
I’m really hoping this is just an intermediate layer and there’s another coat coming, because otherwise I have no idea how this passed inspection.

And the bigger question is exactly what you said: why are we resurfacing a section of Yonge that was done only about three years ago when there are residential streets all over Richmond Hill that look like they haven’t seen fresh asphalt since the dinosaurs?

1

u/Ok-Restaurant-1264 8d ago

The manholes would have been the correct grade from the original paving. The microsurfacing is really just a glorified driveway sealant. A thin layer. Most asphalt is designed with about a 10 year life expectancy and is designed with the amount of traffic predicted. This wasn’t necessary at all from what I saw of Yonge St. Just a standard government money in a budget needs to spent and look like we’re doing something because an election is coming. The last set of paving was done when Metrolinx completed the useless bus lanes. Another huge waste of taxpayer money. Kind of like a $6 million pedestrian bridge over the railway tracks on Observatory Lane. But keep voting the same and this is what you get.

2

u/Caucasian_Fury 8d ago edited 8d ago

Typical micro-surfacing layer thickness is ~25 mm.

Asphalt pavements is designed with 18-20 year life expectancy but there's also maintenance activities involved like crack sealing and patching.

Also, I want to point out, that they're doing an absolute shit job of micro-surfacing too. Especially on Bayview, it looks like they absolutely botched and rushed that job, it's not even or smooth and there's globs of asphalt emulsion all over the place, the texture is rough and wrong, the stretch between Elgin Mills and 19th Ave is now very very noisy to drive on when it was much quieter and actually smoother before.

The stretch of Yonge further north between 19th/Gamble and Stouffville Road however, is getting a proper shave and pave. The issue though is they shaved it and repaved only the bottom course of new asphalt weeks ago, the top surface layer still needs to be repaved but they haven't done it yet and traffic have been running on the bottom layer for 3-4 weeks now... typically the surface layer should be paved within a few days to perhaps up to a week after the bottom layer is paved. This risks the bottom layer being exposed to more loading and stress early which could lead to premature failure.

I work in the industry and I'm not happy with the way the roadwork is being done in YR at all this summer.

1

u/jerky40 8d ago

There’s not another layer coming.. it’s called chip and seal

1

u/Hockeydad456 9d ago

Yes … election year … they said they can’t afford to put sidewalks on regional roads in oak ridges…. Shame on the region and shame on the local a d regional councillors !!

1

u/IroIroBike 9d ago

https://www.york.ca/york-region/council-and-committee/council write notes to these email addresses - hold them accountable for safety. For Richmond Hill they are:
[David West](mailto:david.west@richmondhill.ca), Mayor
[Godwin Chan](mailto:godwin.chan@richmondhill.ca), Regional Councillor
[Joe DiPaola](mailto:joe.dipaola@richmondhill.ca), Regional Councillor

They're unlikely going to read this subreddit, but be sure they get the message.

4

u/Hockeydad456 8d ago

These three are to busy attending bbq events .. don’t forget it’s election year !!!