Kitsap County road crews have wrapped up their chip seal work for the summer season.
In all, about 74 miles of Kitsap County’s 1,800-plus road miles that are maintained with hot oil and crushed rock. Each summer season, county crews re-cover about 12 miles of roads countywide as part of a regular rotation. This summer, crews covered about four miles in the Central Kitsap area.
They also converted a roughly one-mile stretch of Nellita Road, between Seabeck and Holly, from gravel to a chip-seal surface.
“I’ve been with the county since 1991 and that was the first new chip seal road that the county has built,” said Kitsap County Road Superintendent Don Schultz. “So, they are kind of fading away. But other than tree trimming and ditching, we won’t have anything to do out there for years. Before we’d typically be out there three or five times a year.”
Final figures are still being tallied for the project, just completed a couple weeks ago, but it was budgeted to cost between $95,000 to $110,000.
Schultz said when his crews put down one coat of oil and rock, it costs about $13,000 for materials per mile. A one-inch asphalt overlay, meanwhile, costs right around $60,000 per mile. The chip seal will typically last about 12 years, but depending on weather and traffic use can last from 15 to 20 years under good conditions.
And that, Schultz says, can add up to big savings for the county. He says that the “horrendous maintenance costs” of sending crews out to Nellita Road, for example, are a thing of the past.
The county typically spends between $250,000 to $300,000 per year on chip seal materials, Schultz said.
“One of the moving targets there, which is a big variable, is the price of oil,” Schultz said. “That fluctuates pretty dramatically.”
Here is a quick look at Central Kitsap Roads that were chip-sealed this past summer:
• Arizona Street, from Illahee Road to Washington Street
• Washington Street, from Arizona to Utah streets
• Utah Street, from Illahee Road to Washington Street
• William E. Sutton Road, from Highway 303 to .208 miles northeast of Sungate Road
• Holland Road, from Central Valley Road to Tracyton Boulevard
• Bunker Street, from Riddell Road to Vena Street
• Johnson Street, from Riddell Road to Tracy Avenue
• Selbo Road, from Tracy Road to end
• 64th Street, from Central Valley Road to Holland Road
• Hart Street, from Tracy Road to Nichols
• Nellita Spur, from Nellita to Seabeck Holly
• Nellita, from the dead end to the existing chip seal