Councilor Reynolds raised serious concerns about the need for annual line painting due to the lack of durability of the road marking paints used by the City of Greater Sudbury currently during the question portion of Monday's Operations Committee meeting.

Reynolds began by questioning why the city is not using more durable paint such as Epoxy Markings, Epoxy Plastic which last approximately ten years and are less than twice the cost of the regular dry water Paint currently being used.

She the went further stating that she understand that the city is bound by federal provisions but could only find reference to the color of the paint and the consistency.

Finally Reynolds inquired about the results of the tests or "pilot projects" performed on The Kingsway and Falconbridge Rd. And suggested that the city needs to take a deeper look to find a better product.

In addressing Reynolds concerns, the Manager of Infrastructure Services with the City, Tony Cecutti, explained that there been significant changes within the industry which prevents staff from using certain types of paints. He further explained that oil based paints have not only been eliminated due to the oil content in the paint, but also because they contained chemicals like Toluene and the airborne solvents that they contain which are no longer allowed due to the potential hazards to the workers.

Cecutti also offer some clarification with regard to thermal plastics, stating that the city does use these products on a limited basis for crosswalks, cycling routes, and certain other applications, however, they are significantly more costly than the current paint used for regular markings and their durability in our environment is only approximately three years; much less that Reynolds suggested.

He went on to indicate that while staff is aware of the issues surrounding line painting, there is a lack of options available and assured the Committee that the department continues to consult with various groups, the MTO and it‘s colleagues from across Northern Ontario to discuss best practices within the industry before handing the floor over to, Dave Stelsted, Director or Roads and Transportation Services, for some final information.

Shelsted began but explaining that the city trialed the thermal plastics on "chicken tracks“, the lines that guide traffic around the corner of the intersection, at The Kingways and Falconbridge Highway and those thermal plastics didn‘t even last a year and cost significantly more that regular paints. He goes on to explain that the reason this is that any time you have traffic going over the painted surface, sand and other debris acts like sandpaper on those surfaced which is also the reason road markings within the city wear at a high rate than highways; there is simply more movement across those lines.

He continued to explain that they have good results with epoxy based paints in their pilot projects, however, the costs associated with the application and the paint itself are in the neighborhood of ten times that of regular paints and the cost of painted the crosswalks on an entire crosswalk are in the ten‘s of thousands of dollars.

In concluding, Shelsted re-iterating that they continue to collaborate with colleagues, are following what the industry is doing and continue to try new products to determine the best combination of products vs cost.

Reynolds concluded by indicating that the Durham Region currently uses Epoxy markings achieves a life of approximately 4 years at cost of less than twice the cost based on her research. She requested that Mr. Shelsted to take a look at want is being the Durham Region which uses Epoxy Markings and provide a short report based on those findings.