The Starke County Highway Department is wrapping up road improvements for the year. Superintendent Rik Ritzler says they’ve improved more than 120 miles of roads through a combination of chip and fog sealing, asphalt paving and wedging and crack sealing. That’s the most road miles improved in a single year by the Starke County Highway Department.
Ritzler notes this is the first year the county has fog and crack sealed. He notes this is an inexpensive way to keep water from prematurely deteriorating the roadways. Ritzler says it costs about $750 to crack seal a mile of roadway.
He adds the fog sealing was also successful. That process eliminates dust from a chip sealed road, helps seal in the chips, helps with ice and snow melting in the winter and generally looks better than a chip sealed road. Ritzler says that process costs about $1,500 per mile.
