Road repairs have finally begun in Irkutsk. The first site was the troubled intersection of Yadrintsev and Piskunov streets, where cars literally sank in huge puddles. This year 80 million rubles will be allocated for pothole repairs, but no major resurfacing is expected in summer. Roadwork spending has been cut by more than a billion. Full capital repairs are planned only on a few streets, and major work will start with warmer weather and the launch of the asphalt plant.
Irkutsk motorists have been waiting. Road repairs have begun in the regional center. Today, city officials went out to the work site.The first site for the road workers was the intersection of Yadrintsev and Piskunov streets. It is too early to patch the roads, specialists say. A sustained above-zero average daily temperature has not yet set in in Irkutsk. But the measure is unavoidable. This intersection is in a deplorable state. Cars were sinking into huge puddles. The day before, water was pumped out here and pothole repairs began. This year, 80 million rubles will be spent on this.
Meanwhile, no large-scale renewal of the road surface is expected in Irkutsk this summer. The budget line for these purposes has been cut by more than a billion rubles. Last year, 1 billion 700 million was spent. Major repairs are planned on Partizanskaya, 3 Iyulya, Bogdana Khmelnitskogo streets, and at the beginning of Baikalskaya Street. Potholes will be repaired throughout the city. The main work will begin with the launch of the asphalt-concrete plant. This is expected to be done when the weather gets warmer.
- The financial situation is unstable right now. What will happen next is unknown. The program was created back at the end of 2008. It provided for an enormous amount of major repairs. We were supposed to build 3 underground pedestrian crossings. But due to the crisis, it had to be cut back, cut back, - said Sergei Chertkov, head of the Department of Road Construction, Landscaping and Transport of the Irkutsk administration.