Work crews 'reclaiming' Cloverdale Road

Extensive work on Cloverdale Road between Highway 126 and Highway 20 began last week as the Deschutes County Road Department started a project they call Cloverdale Road Reclamation.

The almost $1 million project is necessary because of the rapidly deteriorating cinder base and the steadily increasing truck traffic on Cloverdale Road. Trucks are reportedly traveling the Wilt Road-Camp Polk Road-Cloverdale Road route to avoid the scales on Highway 20. A deteriorating base causes ruts and dips in the road, much like those on Cascade Avenue in downtown Sisters.

A benefit of the project, besides having a new base that should last for years, is that the roadway is being widened from a current average of 24 feet wide to 28 feet wide. This will allow for wider bikeways. With travel lanes of 11 feet in width, an average of 18-24 inches is being added at each shoulder. Unfortunately, there is not enough right-of-way at all sections of Cloverdale Road for the installation of full-width bike paths.

The process of "reclamation" in road construction is not a new concept, but has this decade become increasingly adopted as normal practice. George Kolb, Engineering Services Manager of the Deschutes County Road Department, says that the county has used this process once before. Five miles of Masten Road in the southern part of the county was done last year.

"It was cored 40 days later and the base tested at 500-600 psi, which is right where you want it," Kolb said.

That is engineer-speak confirming that the process of reclamation works.

The first step of the reclamation process consists of pulverizing the existing asphalt concrete pavement and a portion of the underlying base. In the next step the pulverized roadway is graded, during which Portland cement is added. Then the road is regraded, compacted and finally a four-inch asphalt concrete surface is installed.

Reclamation allows for the complete reconstruction of the pavement with little or no excavation and removal costs. It also allows jurisdictions to reuse all of the existing aggregate, saving stone costs, lowering reconstruction costs and saving time. It is also environmentally friendly, as most materials are recycled, thus requiring little or no dumping of waste.

Bids were held on March 2, 2010, with Knife River, Inc. having the low bid of $932,932.32, thus winning the contract and conducting the work. The engineer's estimate was $1,077,588.75. The losing bids of Hooker Creek Companies, LLC ($1,046,969.96) and High Desert Aggregate & Paving ($1,055,227.50) were much in line with the estimate. All costs of the project were paid with funds through the normal county budgeting process, mostly using gas taxes.

The Cloverdale Road project is scheduled to be finished by May 28, but will most likely be finished much sooner. Camp Polk Road will be the next project in the Sisters area using the reclamation process. The work will be done this summer.

For more information, contact the Deschutes County Road Department at

541-388-6581.