Dust Control on Rural Roads

[coppertop]

This topic should probably be under
Rural Issues but I know we have a good
cross section of rural folks in this
group so I wanted to see what happens in
your municipality as far as dust control
( other than the kind we get from the
Man Upstairs).
Our municipality provides dust control
in front of residences on gravel roads
for $150.00 per 200m. The actual cost to
the municipality is $1100.00 per 200m.
The cost breakdown is the product,
trucking, graders etc.
We have had some discussions on council
and there are those who feel the
ratepayer should pay the entire
$1100.00. Some feel that industry pays
80% of the taxes in our municipality and
they are the ones that create the lions
share of the dust so there should be no
problem subsidizing dust control with
industry tax dollars. My view is that
the making the ratepayer fund the entire
cost is penalizing them for living on
gravel roads !
What happens in your areas ?

[per]

Last time I payed for dust control was several years ago and it was $900 for 300m. I don't know what it is now but anytime the dust can be reduced it is a benefit for all, the yard the house the plants and the drivers on the road. Most of the busier roads here have poor mans pavement on them now. They claim it is cheaper in the long run than grading. I sure don't miss the dust.

[coppertop]

thanks per. Our county has continued to
pave local roads, but only a few miles
annually, so there are still a lot of
gravel roads in the area, and a lot of
industry traffic goes down all of them.

[per]

Coppertop, are you referring to the study by the Frontier think tank? I think it is a slippery slope to go to a user pay system. It is a good way to drive industry right down the road by adding more tax and then leaving the remaining folks holding the bag.

[coppertop]

Per, I don't know where you would have
gotten the idea that I feel it should be
user pay. In our municipality industry
pays for damages to the road, they have
to post a bond before they have a rig
move etc., so the county has the funds
to repair damage done. Industry has very
few banned roads to contend with here,
and this is one of the few
municipalities that doesn't ban roads in
the spring, so industry is still able to
move.
Industry pays over 80% of the taxes in
this county and pound out the local
roads so subsidizing dust control for
the residents who contend with dust,
noise and heavy traffic is one way to
lighten the cost of dust control to the
regular taxpayer.

[per]

Sorry Coppertop, I was referring to the article I read after this conversation started. I have no assumptions of what your county does however not banning roads would be nice here too. I was just suggesting or agreeing with you, as it turns out, that banning or extra taxing can be bad news. I like banning speed and keeping the trucks loaded as they do in some states.

[smcgrath76]

North of you CT and here the county
picks up the majority of the tab. I
think it is something like $200 or so.
They are very good about it, and may
waive the cost if the dust is caused by
things like gravel hauling for a road
project, etc. Often the oil companies
that are running up and down the road
will also do the dust control (part of a
good neighbour thing).
In actual fact on the fringes of our
county we have found that the local oil
industry keeps our roads graded, cleared
in the winter, etc.

[coppertop]

Our county requires trucking companies
lgetting development permits to enter in
to road use agreements which can require
them to put water trucks on the road,
pay for dust control, gravel etc. if
they do road damage. Even some of our
larger livestock operators hire water
trucks to water along their silage haul
routes so residents aren't
inconvenienced, of course there are
those that just roar down the road
kicking up dust when hauling silage, and
wonder why the constable is badgering
them !! This county does enter into some
mutual agreements as far as road
maintenance is concerned but the oil
companies do not grade or snowplow
county roads. Our county requires
industry to obtain permits to move rigs,
do major hauls eg: gravel etc. For the
most part industry complies and works
with our public works department but
there are those to like to run banned
oil surface or paved roads , that keeps
two constables busy handing out fines.
All in all, I think every county does
their best to provide service to the
taxpaying public with respect to roads.
Some areas have a lot better access to
gravel than our municipality, we have no
inland gravel source so rely on Surface
Material Leases from SRD to extract our
gravel. These SML's are getting harder
to come by, and we are going to end up
buying land in another county to have a
ready supply of gravel before too long.
Counties like Wetaskiwin have already
had to resort to doing just that . It is
surprising how a few tree huggers can
cost millions to taxpayers for basic
services.