Oshkosh Roads Final Draft

All roads lead to Oshkosh. Unfortunately someone is left with the task of maintaining those roads. The Oshkosh Common Council Candidates debated this and other issues regarding core services on Wednesday, March 23.

Core services are services in which the City of Oshkosh provides to construct and maintain key needs for its citizens. Some of these services include roads, buildings, etc.

“Core services must be watched. We need to take care of what we have right now,” said Meredith Scheuermann.

While the candidates were in a collective agreement to ‘keeping the roads safe,” Brian Poeschl in particular stood out as the forerunner in road care.

Poeschl’s proposal to address and remedy the current road situation is to change “back to an older city ordinance from the early 1990’s,” which mandated that from curb and gutter the width of main roads is to be maintained to 36 feet, and smaller side street be 32 feet.

His proposal also states that roads be covered in asphalt, instead of the now concrete method. This plan makes for an improvement of one extra mile per year, compared to current methods. “It does not sound like a lot, but it quickly adds up,” Poeschl said.

Public Works Director David Patek estimated the transition to the asphalt method will “last about 12 years or so.”

Streets to be fixed are determined by surveys, which tally cars per day. Those with greater activity will receive refurbishment first. Surveys are to be supervised by the Common Council.

"Other people are going to want to be apart of Oshkosh but only if we take care of the core services right now,” Poeschl said.