Uniform construction standards and customer service are the main objectives of the Calvert County 2011 Road Ordinance, for which county staff and the Calvert County Board of County Commissioners held a work session on Jan. 17.

The current road ordinance has not been updated or logically arranged for convenient use since its adoption in 1997, Department of Public Works Deputy Director of Engineering Rai P. Sharma said. Over the years, the state and county have followed new policies not contained in the document, and last fall staff met with local developers and engineers to seek input and revise the ordinance.

“This ordinance has been in the making for years,” Sharma said. “We are trying to make the standards customer-friendly as much as possible.”

In addition, the county compiled a new book, “The Calvert County Construction Standards for Roads, Streets and Incidental Structures,” to maintain uniformity throughout the county, Sharma said, since the department has previously heard complaints from developers that different people told them to follow different standards. “This is the standard everyone will follow, and hopefully we won’t have that issue.”

Some of the revisions include: revamping the road construction plan requirements by providing a detailed checklist to follow; adding design standards for roundabouts, various roads from major connectors to town center boulevards, sidewalks, parking and private road name signs; outlining two bonding methods for developers who wish to obtain building permits and use and occupancy permits; regulating signs and landscaping within the county right of way to prevent sight distance issues at intersections; and requiring “super pave,” a superior performing asphalt that will help county roads last longer, Sharma said.

“We would like to have our roads last much longer” than the current lifespan of 12 to 15 years between pave jobs, he said. “We would like to have them last for 20 years.”

DPW Director Terry Carlson said the state already adopted super pave as the norm, “so we’ve just adopted the state’s standard on this.”

Sharma said super pave costs about $70,400 per mile, or $14,000 more per mile than the regular paving method the county currently uses, “but I believe this will be money well spent.”

“This will reduce the number of times you have to repave a road,” Commissioner Evan Slaughenhoupt (R) said.

Private developers will not be expected to meet the super pave standard, Carlson added.

“One of the new things we’re proposing this year is to have parallel parking,” Carlson said. When new roadside parking is designed, that is the standard that will be followed. “We did this for safety.”

He cited Main Street in Prince Frederick in front of the courthouse as a safety issue, where cars currently park perpendicular to the street and often “knock out both lanes” when backing out of a parking spot. With parallel parking, “they would only knock out one lane.”

Slaughenhoupt also asked if DPW had a standard for developing bike paths. Right now, the county follows the State Highway Administration’s policy, Carlson said, but it is working on an exclusive bike path design. It will not be used for the Dowell Road widening project, however, “because it’ll come up to the front doors of the people,” Sharma said.

The ideal bike trail standard would be like the one in St. Mary’s County that runs by the Patuxent River Naval Air Station, Carlson said. “That’s how it should look.”

Staff will schedule a public hearing before the commissioners pass the ordinance.

In other business, the commissioners:

Ÿ Appointed Gregory Kernan to the Board of Parks and Recreation and Robert Schaefer as an alternate to the Gambling Permit Review Committee, and reappointed Fredric Dellinger to the St. Leonard Architectural Review Committee;

Ÿ Unanimously approved an amendment to the Local Government Insurance Trust, of which the county is a member, to modify the composition of its board of trustees and clarifies trustee eligibility;

Ÿ Unanimously awarded contracts to Fitch Co. of Baltimore for toilet tissue and S. Freedman & Sons Inc. of Landover for paper towels on an as-needed basis. Last year the county spent $25,238.09 on these products;

Ÿ Unanimously approved a budget adjustment of $49,400 in Prince Frederick Capital Connection funds to complete an emergency water line extension along Costley Way after several businesses experienced a well failure. The Water and Sewerage Division is providing water currently through an above ground connection but fears it may freeze, according to a staff report.

mrussell@somdnews.com