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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 4:50 am 
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I live in a gated community of 1-4 acre sites where we own the roads. It is just old enough that the first real road repair work has begun.

Suddenly out of the blue a couple of people on the HOA have taken it upon themselves to order a road study (at a high cost without consulting anyone) and now are saying we need to spend megabucks to completely dig out & replace all our roads (not just add a 2" topping like they do on county roads). They have reported that we also need to add curbs around the whole neighborhood to "hold the road in place" and keep it from cracking near the edges.

Right now we have roads with no curbs just like most county roads across the country.

It is true that the original builder did cut the corners, at least on base material depth, on the last 2 cross roads added, but they are on the rocky portion of the area and actually have held up as well or better than the rest.

They have said that it won't be cost effective to patch the roads in the long run and it would be cheaper to just go ahead and bite the bullet now. From talking to them it appears that the main reason they want this is they like the look of curbs better.

My thoughts is that curbs also mean gutters and lots of work on water control on top of the road work. This will cause a lot of hardship since reshaping most of the neighborhood won't be easy plus at least 9 of us use the existing water flow to maintain large pond levels. I think the water runoff could cost more than the roads and create problems.

I would like to be able to talk intelligently about this proposal at our HOA meeting this Thursday.

I have a PDF of engineering report that I could send someone and I can take pics.

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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 10:35 am 
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I haven't worked with roads but I have had to maintain large paved parking lots. I've run into the same engineering report challenges that you describe, "tear it out and start over". I found a good alternate source of information was available from the suppliers of paving services. You probably want to talk to the owner/estimator from one of the reputable paving companies in your neighborhood. Someone that is very experienced with paving. Get their opinion as to what should be done to remediate the situation in your development. They'll be able to provide you with options and give you the cost and expected service life associated with each option.

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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 10:54 am 
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Curbing should be used ONLY if required by zoning/development ordinances. The addition of curbing would require a storm drainage system; ie. Catch basins and storm sewer pipes. Then you’d need erosion protection at outfalls for the newly concentrated rainfall runoff discharges. Your local ordinances might then require storm water management facilities like retention/detention ponds, level spreaders, etc., etc., $$$$$.

To install curbing, the surrounding grade would have to be raised at least 6 inches above the roads, or the roads would have to be lowered. Do they like sidewalks also?

AVOID CURBS AT ALL COSTS. RATHER SPEND YOUR MONEY NOW ON A LAWYER TO FIGHT THIS. UNSEAT THESE HOA BOZOS.

Road paving failures are usually caused by subgrade failure. If subgrade soils are poorly drained, the wheel loads cause hydraulic failure. Think of a saturated system that receives a vertical load compressing the water/soil beneath it. The hydraulic forces blast soil particles horizontally and eventually destroy the load carrying ability of the soil matrix, pavement drops, cracks, falls apart. Alligator cracks on the paving surface indicate impending subgrade failure.

Your area receives half the rainfall we get in my part of PA, and I don’t know what soil types are in your area, but I would fix subgrade problems ONLY where they exist. A thin overlay would probably be sufficient in the other areas.

I performed civil site development designs (for 10 through 1000+ acres) for industrial and power generation facilities for 40 years. But, no, I’m not interested in reading the report. You can research your local regulations regarding site development/drainage/roads and get an idea of the can-of-worms that be opened.


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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 11:16 am 
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Aww c'mon read the report, it's actually quite small and mostly shows the make up of the some core samples. :shock:

Thanks guys for the responses. The issues with adding a storm drainage system are exactly my worries, well along with the costs when it doesn't appear to be needed.

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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 12:49 pm 
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Ok......send it by "pm"


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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 3:40 pm 
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"..............at least 9 of us use the existing water flow to maintain large pond levels."

If it will affect this, I see water rights lawyers as well.


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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 6:50 pm 
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You might want to see if someone on your HOA board is in bed with the paving company they are planning to use. They may be benefitting financially from that job.

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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 7:39 pm 
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wrightcomputing wrote:
You might want to see if someone on your HOA board is in bed with the paving company they are planning to use. They may be benefitting financially from that job.


This is quite common. There is good money to be made in HOA rules. Get a lawyer experienced in HOA affairs. Sue not only the bozos that are pushing this but anybody in their family that will benefit financially. They will move on to another HOA. This is just a sneaky form of Lobbying.

Tom

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PostPosted: July 17, 2016, 9:03 pm 
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Actually I don't think anyone is in bed with the paving company because they've talked to a couple and seem to be impartial there, but I think they see them as easy marks because both of the people pushing this are more interested in the aesthetics. They think roads without curbing & sidewalks look cheap.

If I were a paving company or engineering firm I'd be happy to take their money also.

What peeves most of us off is that the contracted for the study without asking permission.

We have only recently taken over the HOA from the builder/developer of the neighborhood and are still getting things set up as we like them.

While I do agree HOAs have no reason for their existence in the city, out in the country they are almost a necessity as they give you all those "little" rules that city people take for granted such as speed limits, not cars up on blocks for long periods of time, the grass can't get higher than an elephant's eye, etc.

BUT THEY MUST BE CONTROLLED!

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 3:06 pm 
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I'll burn my house to the ground before I submit to an HOA.

Total crock of [PooPoo] they are.

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 3:47 pm 
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carguy123 wrote:
...While I do agree HOAs have no reason for their existence in the city, out in the country they are almost a necessity as they give you all those "little" rules that city people take for granted such as speed limits, not cars up on blocks for long periods of time, the grass can't get higher than an elephant's eye, etc...

I recently looked at a 5-acre lot in the country run by an HOA. One of the CCRs was "no chickens." Really? Not even hens? Another was, "You can't grow trees that block neighbors' views." Where does that end, as anyone can look in any direction any time, so any tree is fair game. That sort of thing soured me on ever looking at anything run by HOAs.

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 4:19 pm 
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carguy123 wrote:
Suddenly out of the blue a couple of people ....order a road study ..... and now are saying we need ....to completely dig out & replace all our roads......we also need to add curbs ......to "hold the road in place" and keep it from cracking near the edges.

.......

My thoughts is that curbs also mean gutters and lots of work on water control on top of the road work. This will cause a lot of hardship since reshaping most of the neighborhood won't be easy plus at least 9 of us use the existing water flow to maintain large pond levels. I think the water runoff could cost more than the roads and create problems.

I would like to be able to talk intelligently about this proposal at our HOA meeting this Thursday.


I think you are right about the gutters and probably storm sewers too. That requires retention ponds for filtering the runoff before returning water to the watershed. Not to mention the EPA and wildlife impact studies. One thing lead to another, to another. It sounds to me that these 2 people should pay for the study out of their own pockets and asked if they personally want to pay for the "upgrades" out of their pockets too. It sounds like they are not happy with the neighborhood they bought in to and now are asking everyone else pay for their vision. Some peoples' kids! The threat of a personal lawsuit against them plus one against the HOA if they try to move forward should stop them pretty quickly. I hate lawsuits but sometimes it is the only way to stop the idiocy.

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 4:45 pm 
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Location: Fort Worth, Texas
Our bylaws are pretty simple and easy to live with. We are restricted from crowing roosters, but cows & horses are OK.

We have the usual deed restriction type of items to help ensure we have a neighborhood that continues to be reasonably homogenous in sizes & looks and if these 2 persist they will be asked to leave the HOA. We don't put up with no [PooPoo].

This caught everyone off guard because we thought it was all about getting ready for & budgeting for future road repairs which are inevitable.

HOAs can be good outside the city limits.

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 7:37 pm 
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I'm with 1055 on this too.
But then again, in CT if you are outside city limits, you are just in a different town. No such thing as land that isn't part of some town or city here. You really can't be outside some regions jurisdiction. So here an HOA is just additional rules on top of the already restrictive stuff from the gov't.

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PostPosted: July 18, 2016, 7:43 pm 
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Location: san francisco bay area
I live in an HOA, it's good for some things and a pain in the tuckus about other things.
For example, one of my ex-neighbors complained once because another neighbor uses his garage as a warehouse for his liquor store....
BFD I say plus I always know where to go to have a snort!
On the plus side, pool, tennis courts, landscaping maintenance, road maintenance, etc., other than a bit of back and forth about expense at meetings it's pretty easy.
We have curbs and a drainage system, the county required it when the place was built.
I'm STILL tempted to put a bronze prancing horse statue in my front yard once in a while. :rofl:

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