Kirksville Road Repairs

Due to a lack of funding, Kirksville is hindered from completing necessary repairs on the roads.

Glenn Balliew, director of public works in Kirksville, has shifted the majority of his focus from other departments to mostly street maintenance. However, as of now, he doesn’t have the funds to meet his goal for progress. With the current budget, there is enough money to make repairs on about three miles of road per year. In order to comple​​te the necessary repairs for a 15 year rotational basis of road repair that Balliew is aiming for, the city would have to fund up to 6.6 miles of road each year to stay on schedule.

“The engineering estimate to repair [Illinois Street] and get the drainage right on it is $2.7 million,” said Balliew. “So I could spend every dime I have in the budget for over two years and still can’t fix that road—and that’s [without] repairing another pothole any place in town.”

According to Ray Sandstrom, the Supervisor for Street Maintenance, one of the biggest concerns with the roads in Kirksville is drainage. Sandstrom says the roads are being paved in ways that don’t allow proper drainage.

In the case of Baltimore, as mentioned by Balliew, the last time work was done to that road, it was done so in an unconventional way in his opinion. He noted that the old concrete was not torn up and then repaired, rather the new road was built on top of the old one. This elevated the road above the curb, making drainage more difficult, thus destroying the sides of the road over time. Balliew hopes that some repairs could be done to Baltimore within the next 3-5 years.

While in Kirksville, Baltimore Street is actually a part of highway 63, so it is under the jurisdiction of the Missouri Department of Transportation (MODOT). Any construction that must be done on the highway must be approved and completed by MODOT. Although Baltimore is a major street in Kirksville and is in need of repair—particularly the stretch between Patterson and Illinois as per Sandstrom, the remaining Kirksville roads are in need of repair, too.

Kirksville drivers such as Zach Breckle have expressed concerns about the conditions of the roads as well. “I’m more afraid that they’ll hurt my car more than anything else,” said Breckle.