How does the roads in the City of Ripon rate?
The Pavement Control Index, which, according to Engineering Supervisor James Pease, is a report that cities such as Ripon use to identify the overall condition of the streets and roads.
PCI is a rating scale of 0 to 100 – 0 rating for roadways in the poorest condition while 100 for the best maintained roadways.
Ripon received a PCI rating for 2016 of 68.5, Pease noted.
“The recommended target for the City of Ripon is 70, which is considered ‘very good,’” he said.
The 68.5 rating puts Ripon in the high end of the ‘good’ category.
The general PCI description for the 69 to 60 ratings is “pavements exhibit some low-severity distresses but still have satisfactory ride quality,” the report said.
Pavements at the low end of the ‘good’ range have significant levels distress and may require a combination of rehabilitation and preventative maintenance to keep from deteriorating rapidly.
The ‘very good’ category is the 89 to 70 ratings, with pavements here requiring mostly preventative maintenance and only low levels of distress such as minor cracks. The PCI 100 to 90 ratings or ‘excellent’ applies to pavements that are newly constructed or resurfaces with few to no distresses.
Ripon’s latest evaluation is actually 4.5 percent better – or 64 – than the one conducted in 2010.
Two reasons for this improvement, said Pease, are that in the last 10 years developers have been required to install concrete paver streets in new subdivisions. “An emphasis has been placed on preserving and maintaining pavement before they completely fail and would cost more to fix,” he added.
The amount of street repairs completed each year in Ripon is limited by the funding received from state and local sources – Highway Users Tax, Local Transportation Fund, and Measure K, for example.
“Over the next five years, a total of $2 million will be available from state and road projects,” said Pease at the Jan. 10 Ripon City Council meeting. “The strategy moving forward would be to preserve the existing pavement and also reduce maintenance and repair burden on limited city budget resources.”
He’ll continue to look at new opportunities on funding the local for streets and roads.
The typical life of a roadway is 25 to 40 years, depending on the usage.
For those streets with higher daily traffic volume – collector or arterial – could expect a typical life of 25 years. Roads that primarily serve residential area with lower daily usage could expect a longer life span.
A PCI rating of 60 is considered the ‘tipping point’ for a road.
“At this point, the road has lived 75 percent of its serviceable life and will have experienced a 40 percent drop in quality of no treatment is applied,” Pease said in his report. “However, after several more years, rapid deterioration resulting in another 40 percent drop in quality could take place.”

To contact reporter Vince Rembulat, e-mail vrembulat@mantecabulletin.com.