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Parking lot violated standards
Published Thursday, June 5, 2008
NATCHEZ — Just when it appeared construction was complete at the Country Inn and Suites, half of the parking lot has been uprooted.
City Engineer David Gardner said the reason it’s being torn up is because it never met city engineering and construction standards.
When the asphalt for the lot was initially laid, there were several complications that made it uneven and lumpy, said Walter Tipton, a member of the management group New Orleans Hospitality Consultants.
“Mostly it had to do with the timing because they put it down during a couple of very wet weeks in January,” Tipton said.
Gardner said the city has strict standards for parking lots and has since 1995.
“Prior to 1995 parking lots were not given much thought so you see a lot around town prior to 1995 that have a lot of potholes in them or are structurally a mess,” he said.
He said had the city known the current lot would be the end result it would have never happened.
“We did not approve that parking lot to be built like that,” he said. “It undermines our policies on qualities of parking lots in and around the city.”
Tipton said hotel officials have always had the intention of fixing it.
“It’s an obvious construction problem and we’ve been negotiating to have it addressed ever since it was put down,” Tipton said. “We want it to be perfect.”
He said it should only take three or four days to complete the repaving since it only took two days to pave the first time.
“It’s not an overwhelming job,” he said.
This construction will not conflict with the hotel’s grand opening, scheduled for June 12.
Comments
Posted by sparky018 (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 1:34 a.m. (Suggest removal)
There goes that $2 hotel assesment tax already.
Posted by mike8427 (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 7:45 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Good job city of Natchez, I am glad to see we are starting get things built right. I am tired of seeing bad work let go. Now if we can just start enforcing some traffic laws.
Posted by triscuit (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 7:51 a.m. (Suggest removal)
"Violated" means something different from "didn't meet." Sounds like they were ALLOWED to go ahead knowing they would have to fix it later, or an inspection wasn't made by the city prior to paving. "Violated" means something different from "didn't meet." Either the city missed something, or this is not a story.
Posted by redusmfan (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 8:08 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I have had projects where th finish coarse of paving did not meet standards and we had to mill it out and re-lay it...no big deal. Not a real story....just one of the things that happens all the time in construction . We are re-painting a wall today because when we truned on the lights we had a lighter tone than we wanted....we will darken it today...no story...it is construction....
Posted by sayitloud (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 8:09 a.m. (Suggest removal)
WHAT? So there are strict guidelines for flippin parking lots but NOT for our streets?
something wrong with that one!
Posted by kpage (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 9:06 a.m. (Suggest removal)
"flippin parking lots"...LOL sayitloud!!! Good point.
The way I see it, the company who layed the asphalt in the first place knew it was a shoddy job and let it stay. The builder who built my home (no, I won't call his well-known name) left out an important step in pouring the concrete for our carport...now it sweats. I assume it was cheaper to cheat the homeowner...after all, what do we know?
Posted by progressntz81 (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 9:32 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Way to go Camo!
I can't believe the Democrat did not even put Camo in the article. You would think that they would report the company that did such a terrible job.
Posted by kpage (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 10 a.m. (Suggest removal)
CAMO DID IT, YALL! CAMO, CAMO, CAMO!!!! SHODDY ASPHALT LAYERS...CAMO, CAMO, CAMO.
Thanks, progressntz81.
Posted by sammohon (anonymous) on June 6, 2008 at 11:10 a.m. (Suggest removal)
This is a non-story...the parking lot was put down quickly, cheaply and under bad weather conditions in order to facilitate the construction of the rest of the hotel....it is now being corrected by the owner to meet the City requirements...the owner is doing what they're supposed to do, the city is doing what they're supposed to do...If Camo was involved they did what they were asked to do and are now probably the ones correcting it...it doesn't mean that they did shoddy work...that's an unfair characterization made by people who probably don't know anything about the construction industry or the process.
Posted by Morticia (anonymous) on June 19, 2008 at 3:55 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Okay great they get a new parking lot but what about the mess of a parking lot at Tracetown? I'm scared one day a pothole is going to swallow me whole.
Posted by Peace007 (anonymous) on June 20, 2008 at 2:08 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I still don't think that parking lot is large enough to accomodate that hotel if it ever rents out all of the rooms. Perhaps they should have placed that little kiddie pool indoors.
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