The days of hard-to-see lane lines and rough pavement along a southbound section of Spreckels Avenue are numbered.

City of Manteca street crews are scheduled to perform a paving and striping project between DuPont Court and Norman Avenue  today  through July 3 from 7 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

The endeavor will require lane closures and traffic control.

The 23-year-old four-lane street about 12 years ago started getting heavier use when Industrial Park Drive was extended to connect with it.

That increased the amount of truck traffic significantly. That is blamed, to a degree, for the emergence of potholes, the washboard effect, broken asphalt segments and cracks.

The work starting this week  dovetails into a project city crews performed last June that addressed pavement issues on Spreckels Avenue between Moffat Boulevard and a point just past the BMX track last June.

It is part of Manteca’s “new” path started in mid-2023 when it comes to addressing pavement issues.

The city is taking street repairs into their own hands when they can.

The City Council — working with essentially an all-new city hall leadership team assembled over the past five years — put in place an “in-house” street improvement strategy.

It doesn’t tackle larger pavement needs such as rebuilding road sections or annual massive overlay efforts to extend the life of streets such as the $2.4 million project the council awarded a bid for on Tuesday to improve Lathrop Road pavement between Highway 99 and Union Road.

 But it does allow the city to chip away at some of the most egregious segments of pavement in Manteca.

 The city used part of its federal COVID relief funding to purchase equipment city crews needed to do specialized street repair work in addition to their day-to-day street maintenance duties.

It included spending $600,000 for an asphalt grinder and skid steer as part of its effort to have city street crews do more complex road repairs  

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com