The City Council has asked the Maintenance Department to clear the dirt from the roads and the Inhulsky Bridge in Mykolaiv

Dirt on the roads of Mykolaiv, archive photo by NikVesti

Mykolaiv City Council has approached the Infrastructure Restoration and Development Service with a request to clear the dirt from roads and bridges that are under their jurisdiction but are located within the city limits.

This was stated by Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych in a comment to NikVesti.

A significant amount of sand remained on Mykolaiv’s roads after the winter period — it was used to treat the roads during icy conditions. Currently, says the mayor, municipal services are clearing the sand in stages: first, they collect the bulk of it by hand, after which specialised machinery is brought in for the clean-up.

«It must be said that the recent icy conditions have been the worst we’ve seen in the last 10 years. We were no longer able to spread salt, so we used a sand-salt mixture with the highest possible sand content. Our vacuum cleaners are now operating in those areas where manual labourers have already passed and shovelled up large quantities of the sand used during the winter. We are continuing to clear this up. That is, first we need to clear it all away manually and only then go over it with our vehicles and vacuum cleaners, which are also operating in the city,» said the mayor.

At the same time, within Mykolaiv there are sections of roads of national importance that are not under the city’s jurisdiction, added Oleksandr Sienkevych. This refers, in particular, to certain main roads and bridges, the maintenance of which falls under the remit of the Regional Infrastructure Restoration and Development Service.

«We have written a letter from the city council to the Road Restoration Service, which is responsible for the cleaning and maintenance of these roads. This includes Heroes of Ukraine Avenue, part of Pushkinska Street — now Arkasivska Street — Velyka Morska Street, and the exit from the city towards Odesa. Unfortunately, we have not yet received a reply. We are keeping this matter under review. We have sent another enquiry. I will be meeting with the head of the regional military administration, Vitalii Kim, in the near future, and I will raise this point. Actually, you’re right; on these very roads, in some places you simply can’t see the kerb because of the dirt that has accumulated there. And we can’t clean it up, because then the State Audit Service will say that this isn’t within our remit and that we’ve spent budget funds on cleaning roads that aren’t on our books,» said Oleksandr Sienkevych.

As a reminder, in Mykolaiv, after the winter, sand and rubbish remained on the cycle paths along the kerbs. Cyclists complain that this causes punctures.

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And what about road repairs in Mykolaiv?

Following this year’s winter, deep potholes have appeared on Mykolaiv’s roads due to the effects of freeze-thaw cycles and the de-icing agents used on the asphalt surface.

Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych stated that there are currently no funds in the city budget for routine or major road repairs. He noted that the budget contains only 20 million hryvnias exclusively for patching potholes for the entire year.

Meanwhile, in a comment to NikVesti, Vitalii Shevchenko, director of the municipal enterprise ELU Avtodorig, said that there would be no large-scale patching of potholes on Mykolaiv’s roads for about another month due to unstable weather conditions and the dampness of the road sub-base.

In early March, municipal workers began patching potholes on Tsentralnyi Avenue.

And the Mykolaiv budget has allocated 14 million hryvnias for emergency and pothole repairs on the roads.