Road Construction

I think my wife is shaking her head a great deal the past couple months at the road work on Creamery Rd in McFarland. Most of the work involves taking a narrow rural cross section roadway to mainly a widened roadway with mostly an urban section. While mostly standard curb and gutter, a portion has  ribbon curb, which the wife says is akin to just a narrower sidewalk. A ribbon curb allows water to flow over the edge, but the concrete holds the road edge better than a typical asphalt with gravel shoulder edge. The road runs by and probably through wetlands, which makes the challenge of construction even greater. It is like a never-ending project and in part shows the absurd nature, almost folly, of road construction and getting things done correctly.

Tan gravel near hydrant shows area of 
additional cut and fill of gravel

When desiring to get out you could look and see what way to go out, left or right. But, coming home would be a different story, with several more minutes to add if I have to enter from the east rather than our standard from the west. The reason is you do not know what part is being worked on. As I write this they have been replacing curb in the small urban section. This portion did not see the water and storm sewer installation the rural section, across from our street and to the east had seen.   It was a crap shoot, only times to figure out you had to back up and turn around and go the other way. Biking, is much easier, I biked on the road on the dirt ripped up from a former narrow asphalt path, and I biked over gravel piles and around equipment. Last week Tuesday we were coming home from a shopping trip and they were pouring curb which took up the whole road to the east of our entry point, but they had equipment digging out soft spots to the west side, at which I waited, until a dump truck driver signaled me to move ahead, and for which, lucky I have a four wheel drive Jeep to get over the holes and gravel piles to get home. When we left they were only pouring curb, and digging soft spots at the other side of entry. 

Our street showing curb just poured at 
intersection with Creamery Rd

The folly of the construction process, and I think this project is using federal highway money which is generally 80% of the cost, is in the undercutting of poot soils. During design it is easy to calculate amount of concrete, and asphalt, by the known dimensions and convert to cubic yards, or tons. However, soils vary and can pose an issue. In this case the engineer designated an 18" undercut of current soil conditions, and for over a few weeks the contractor did just that, cut down 18", and filled the area with gravel. In this case a known quantity. What is unknown is what further undercutting may need to occur. Biking by one day where they were undercutting you could see clay, with perched water on top, the engineer allowed another 12 to 18" cut which they did, and backfilled with gravel. The method of excavation had one large excavator, digging and dumping soil into a dump truck which went out one direction, and a dump truck with gravel coming in from the other. Gravel was dumped and spread by a bull dozer, and in some cases of further undercutting, by a bob cat. A large roller went over the area. Perhaps at some point they will get it right and will be able to pave.

Looking down Creamery Rd from our street

Even though it was noticed by any one with eye sight that the soil should have been cut out some more, it was not approved. That is until the proof roll test. This is a highly sophisticated test of a dump truck filled with gravel and going slowly down the edge of the road (why edges are suspect, I don't know) and an engineer tech or engineer watch the gravel to see how much deflection is present. If they don't like the deflection it is marked with spray paint. The crew then comes back takes out the gravel and digs deeper and puts perhaps some dug out gravel, but seemed mostly new in the cut. They then proof roll it again. 

The highly scientific method of proof-rolling
Proof-rolling area marked was cut and filled previous day
They found a soft area that was once again dug out and filled

They dug up the end of our street, perhaps 40 or more feet, pavement that was just installed in 2021, and proof rolled at that time. Low and behold, the area cut out and filled with gravel a few years ago did not pass the test and was cut again. Seeing the operation as I biked by, and talking with the contractors, it seems that some areas on this project were dug out three times. I inquired of a contractor why not just remove it in the first place when one can see it is bad soil, and he said, it is part of the process intended to save money, by only doing areas not passing the proof roll test.

Proof Roll test and need for excavation prohibited
curb from being poured beyond  fire hydrant, and the
opposite side.

As I pick this up again, they just, once again on Friday, dug up at the end of our street what they had dug up and replaced with gravel just earlier this week. This area was dug for storm sewer and filled with gravel, then they dug out 12-18" and put in gravel, then they proof rolled and dug out the gravel and even more, then they must have proof rolled once again and today are digging it once again. Four times they have dug the same area at the end of our street. I am not sure who the engineer is that he cannot allow the proper depth to be dug out the first time. This is hoping the fourth time is a charm.

The extra cutting then limited the ability of the concrete sub contractor to complete the curb and gutter on the intended day, so they did not finish pouring curb until this Monday afternoon. Not only that, but two days of rain inundated some of the excavation area in which the curb was to be poured, especially the area where they are replacing curb in the west section toward Main Street. On Friday, last week they able to pour drive approaches. It will be interesting to see when the slip form curb machine is brought back to complete the curb. This curb delay likely means that the pavement installation will be delayed. The road, with gravel, is still rough with large dips. 

The project was, we were told, to be completed by the end of August, that switched to Sep 18. Given the amount of underground work and cutting the end of August was highly suspect for a project that started about five weeks earlier.

Photos by author, Sep 29, 2026 and Oct 2, 2026