Residents of Riverbank were inconvenienced in several areas around town when several streets in both commercial and residential areas were blocked off for road work over the past week.

Streets in the business and residential districts downtown as well as those in some neighborhoods in western Riverbank were affected by the temporary closures.

The ‘Slurry Seal’ project started on Monday, June 6 and continues through today, Wednesday June 15 and covered a total of 2,093,013 square feet encompassing over 70 different roads throughout the city. There were multiple streets on the list for the work and the final streets are expected to be completed today, June 15, with work from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m.

Impacts are anticipated today on roads including parts of Cedarwood Drive, Woodgate Circle, Oakdale Road, Donner Trail, Silversmythe Lane, Glow Road, Corral Way, Blacksand Creek, Cool Water Court, Riverbed Court, and Gold River Court.

“A slurry seal is a thin maintenance treatment mixture of asphalt emulsion, graded aggregates, mineral filler, fiber, water and additives,” stated Laura Graybill, Project Coordinator for the City of Riverbank Development Services Department. “When placed on the pavement surface the mixture breaks and cures creating a new wearing surface. A street is slurry sealed to extend the life of the street.”

The work happened in several stages, with barricades placed to notify residents of the upcoming closure one or two days ahead. Then workers scraped paint and any other indicators off the surface of the roadway, so the new surface would stick. A day later, the streets would be completely blocked while a crew applied the hot oil slurry seal coating on top of the surface. Then, it had to cool off and cure before the street could be reopened to traffic.

The work was organized in one or two block swaths, so the disturbance to traffic flow in the city could be kept to a minimum.