South Dakota has more than 80,000 miles of road. From the high-traffic interstates that span border-to-border to rural thoroughfares that support just a few vehicles, maintaining quality and access is no easy task. As part of our ongoing series, this Dakota Digest examines the state of our state’s roads.
"We’re responsible for what’s defined by the legislature as the state highway systems. There are about 82,500 miles of public roads in South Dakota," Bergquist says. "About nine percent of those make up the state highway system, so we’re the entity who’s got primary responsibility over those."
Darin Bergquist is the Secretary of South Dakota’s Department of Transportation. He is in charge of the department that maintains the state’s roadways. He says, at the DOT level, crews manage two surfaces.
"It’s the black or it’s the white," Bergquist says. "The black is asphalt, which is really basically, rock and oil mixed together to form a hard surface. The white is the concrete."
Bergquist says the department conducts a robust road survey each year to establish the current condition of main roads across the state.
"Are they deteriorating? Are we seeing cracking? Are we seeing rotting? Those kind of things. And then we gather all that data together, and use our pavement management system to determine, okay, of all the needs that we have across the state, which ones are the highest priority? Which ones need the most work or need work first, and what’s the best treatment, the most economic and efficient treatment to bring those roads up to a better condition?" Bergquist says.
The pavement under the DOT’s jurisdiction sustains two-thirds of all the miles traveled statewide, and the Transportation department works with local governments on road-related projects.
Sioux Falls is home to the most condensed traffic in South Dakota, and city engineer Chad Huwe has the task of overseeing this metro’s streets. Sioux Falls crews build arterial roads that support large volumes of traffic, but smaller streets are established within communities.
"And then the collector streets, those are streets that are built by the developer. And then the local streets, the street where you live on, that’s also built by the developer," Huwe says. "They put that infrastructure in the ground. They build the roads to our standards. We accept them, and then we turn them over to us, and they’re ours."
So the city becomes accountable for maintaining the fresh roadway. The traffic aspect of public works requires constant coordination. Despite construction, Sioux Falls must maintain access to businesses. They have to consider places people go everyday, like schools. Other utilities like water and electricity crisscross everywhere beneath the roads. And leaders have to coordinate with other construction projects and detours to preserve traffic flow.
"We’ve got to balance the growth we’re going through and building those new roads, but then you’ve also got to look at intersections like 57th and Western that carry 25,000 vehicles a day. You’ve got to make capacity improvements there to keep traffic moving," Huwe says. "We’re working all the time with Lincoln County and Minnehaha County, too, because, as we grow, we take over some of the roads that they used to have."
County roads are another layer of South Dakota’s sprawling transportation infrastructure. Most of the roads under county control are gravel. Benny Joe Schell is Corson County’s longtime Highway Superintendent.
"Pavement is a lot different and easier to maintain. It costs more on pavement, but gravel roads are a lot higher maintenance," Schell says.
Schell explains that Corson County stretches west from the Missouri River about 100 miles in north-central South Dakota, and all his roads are gravel. His crew uses seven road grater blades across the entire county to work the gravel and clear snow from the rocky surface.
"When you only got seven guys on 900 miles of road, it just ain’t a go-do thing right away. It takes time, and they just know that we will be coming and we will do what we can, which is a great thing," Schell says. "People in the cities, they think that they’ve got to get stuff done right away, and it might happen. But out here, it don’t. "
In addition to county and city and state roadways, South Dakota has thoroughfares that townships maintain. They have to be 66-feet across, but the roads are often gravel or dirt, and people in the township have greater local control of what happens on those roads.
Corson County’s Benny Joe Schell says he drives the roads to gain an understanding of which areas need the most attention. The Secretary of South Dakota’s Department of Transportation says sometimes that’s the best test.
"I've had the opportunity to, in the last few months, drive through Nebraska, Minnesota, Colorado, Wyoming and compare some of their roads to our roads, Based on my own seat-of-the-pants and what I’ve seen when I drive, our roads are in great condition," Bergquist says.
Bergquist says surrounding states have heavy trucks and thick traffic challenges South Dakota doesn’t. The secretary says, though roads across the state do have challenges, he hears from people traveling through South Dakota who say their rides go smoothly.
Secretary Bergquist says one aspect of South Dakota’s transportation people hear about is the condition of bridges across the state. He says reports take average accounts of bridges, including rarely-traveled rural bridges. The DOT leader says the state’s bridges are safe.