Lake Mountain Road gets a new set of teeth

April 9, 2018, 7:45 am

By Mike Kieffer

One of the problems with the explosive growth of Eagle Mountain is transportation. Transportation has been a constant battle and will continue to be one as the city feels the pains of growth. But one of the side effects of that growth is unintended traffic on roads that were never designed for that type of traffic. Lake Mountain Road has been around for as long as anyone can remember. If you ask anyone from Lehi, Cedar Fort or prior to Eagle Mountain cities, they will have stories about driving down Lake Mountain Road to hunt, camp, or go shooting. The road was originally owned by the county and the responsibilities of maintaining it were transferred to the City when Eagle Mountain was created. With the growth of the city, that road is now seeing traffic that was never intended for that type of road. The construction traffic and non-Lake Mountain Road resident traffic has had a huge impact on the road.

The city has been working to try to resolve the issue. The first step was to lay down asphalt millings. The millings are a by-product of removing the top layer of asphalt to prepare to resurface the road. The millings were originally used to reduce the dust on the road, and to avoid having the large rocks on the road damage tires. These millings were created by resurfacing other roads in Eagle Mountain. The millings were transported to Lake Mountain Road and then used as a replacement to the gravel on the road. But with the additional traffic, and the speed of that traffic, those millings soon turned into a hard washboarded or corrugation road.

The city has been grading to the road to try to keep up with the washboarding, but they have run into the issue of the millings getting compacted and with the heat and use of the road they have turned back into asphalt. The current grading blade they were using just started to skip over the washboarding, not allowing them to get down deep enough to remove it. Within days after they finished grading the road the washboarding would return.

The City Roads Department, lead by Zac Hilton, has come up with a way to get that blade to cut through the hardened millings. For $4,686 the city was able to retrofit the blade they use with the same teeth that are used by the machines that create the millings. The money was taken from the existing streets budget for the year. The city rents a grader, "because that is a more cost-effective solution at the time", and they own the blade that is used. The City will install the blade on the grader, do the grading, and then remove the blade. The blade is stored inside the City's shop when not in use.

Lake Mountain Road is currently the only road in Eagle Mountain that uses the millings. But the city believes that using this blade on the other dirt roads in Eagle Mountain will break up and crush the large exposed rocks that are problematic when grading and leveling the dirt roads.

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Lake Mountain Road gets a new set of teeth

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