Sage and Saga io Sagebrush

ROAD MAINTENANCE By HARRY DUBERSTEIN Maintenance Engineer Arizona Highway Department

Road maintenance is one of the principal factors in good roads. Every per-son who travels over the highways of Arizona is pleased with the road sys-tem of the state; yet very few people realize what is taking place to keep the roads in a high state of repair after they have been built. In Arizona road maintenance has been perfected to a high degree of efficiency at a cost that rates the Arizona highway department one of the most efficient and economical in the country. The total mileage maintained in Ari-zona in the state highway system is 3,530 miles, at a yearly cost of $1,500,000, which amounts to $422.00 or $1.16 per mile per day, including emergency, signs, striping and roadside improvement.

Labor will average 52 per cent of the total amount, gas and oil 10 per cent equipment 22 per cent and materials and miscellaneous 16 per cent. In the language of money, labor costs $780,000, employing 475 men, including foremen, which averages $1642.00 per year per man. Gas and oil cost $150,000, equipment rental $420,000, material and mis-cellaneous $150,000. Dirt and gravel roads cost more per mile to maintain; then comes oil, old concrete, new oil and new concrete.

The Arizona state highway system is divided into four districts and forty sec-tions. The district engineer has under supervision all the maintenance work in his district. The detail work is done by the maintenance engineer. A mainten-ance foreman is in direct charge of a section; he reports to the maintenance engineer or directly to the district engi-neer. The maintenance engineer reports to the district engineer. At the present time one maintenance engineer serves two district engineers.

Accurate cost accounts are kept daily on ten maintenance operations: (1) supervision, (2) surface upkeep, (3) shoulder, (4) drainage, (5) structures, (6) roadside and beautification, (7) traffic service, (8) traffic count, (9) snow and sand removal, (10) emergency. Surface upkeep includes blading and grading on gravel roads, patching and sealing on oil, and cutting joints and mending on concrete. This operation costs 75 per cent of the total maintenance operation. All the other operations combined cost the 25 per cent. Dirt and gravel roads use 45 per cent of the cost for labor, 15 per cent for gas and oil, 35 per cent for equipment and five per cent for materials and miscellaneous.

Oil roads use 55 per cent of its cost for labor, eight per cent for gas and oil, 20 per cent for equipment and 17 per cent for materials. The high cost of materials in oil roads is due to buying stock material for patching and road oil for