Providence Celebrates St. Patrick's and St. Joseph's Days

Providence City Hall was filled with Irish music and dance on Tuesday as Mayor Cicilline hosted the annual St. Patrick’s Day celebration.  Crossroads Rhode Island President Anne Nolan was this year's speaker, and the celebration included traditional Celtic sounds and Irish step dancing performed by the Goulding School of Irish Dance. Today, Mayor Cicilline hosted the St. Joseph’s Day celebration at City Hall.  Community College of Rhode Island President Ray M. Di Pasquale delivered this year's remarks, and Soprano Loriana De Crescenzo beautifully performed Italian folk songs including “O Sole Mio.”

In his remarks at both events, Mayor Cicilline celebrated the lasting legacy of the values brought over by American immigrants. "They brought our values of hard work, faith, family and tradition to America and raised children to make the most of the opportunities afforded them by the New World." He also encouraged residents to attend the annual St. Patrick's Parade this Saturday that starts on Smith St. and Admiral at noon.
 

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Mayor Cicilline will appear on CNN Saturday Morning on March 21st at 8:15 a.m. to discuss federal recovery spending for education 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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 Bank of America City Center Skating Rink Wrapping Up 2008/2009 Season

Last day for public skating is Sunday, March 22; rink to offer “Skate for Half Price” weekend
 

The air is fresh and the skates are sharp at the Bank of America City Center skating rink - one of New England's most popular destinations for late-winter fun. It still offers 2004 prices in the 2009 economy for families looking for fun without breaking the bank. And the final day to enjoy this glamorous outdoor fun is Sunday, March 22nd!

During this skating season over 46,000 skaters have enjoyed the outdoor skating experience in Downtown Providence.  As a special thank you to our loyal skating customers, the rink will offer “Skate for Half Price” this weekend Saturday and Sunday.  Skate admission for all skaters will be just $3 and skate rental will be just $2.

For more information about the skating rink, including birthday parties and group rates, visit the Bank of America City Center website at www.providenceskating.com or call (401) 331-5544.

 

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First Annual Senator Claiborne Pell Lecture on Arts and Humanities In Session
Last event on March 24

 

The following remaining event will bring together participants from the local creative community to build on the findings of Creative Providence: A cultural plan for the creative sector:

 

Educate for lifelong creativity
March 24 | 9 am – 12 pm | New Urban Arts, 743 Westminster Street
Developing creative thinking and practice in youth for 21st-century global citizenship

 

Providence business, educational, civic and cultural leaders and creative professionals are encouraged to attend. The event is free.  However, registration for each event will be limited on a first come, first served basis. Please visit www.creativeprov.org or call (401) 421-2489 x456 for more information.

 

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Feature: My City
DPW Director John Nickelson Paving Roads to Opportunity

 

 

Under Mayor Cicilline's 18-month economic action plan, Operation Opportunity, the city will invest $10 million towards road improvement. Using a computerized pavement management system, the Providence Department of Public Works (DPW) is working on plans now to assess roads that need most work. Also under Operation Opportunity, DPW plans to double the citywide recycling rate by ramping up more education and outreach to neighbors.

City News caught up with DPW Director John Nickelson at headquarters on Allens Avenue.

In brief, what does the Department of Public Works do on a daily basis?
On a daily basis, the DPW is responsible for making the roads safe and passable, for collecting the waste and recyclables around the city along with Waste Management. We are also responsible for the sewage collection system of waste and water from the city borders to the Narrangasett storm runoff. The traffic portion that the department is responsible for is the maintenance of traffic signals, traffic signs, pavement markings and parking meters on the City’s nearly 2,100 streets (366 miles of roadway). An our engineering department reviews site plans and issues permits for construction.

One of the goals under the Mayor's Operation Opportunity is to invest dollars to improve roads in Providence. Tell us more about this goal.
The Mayor has made a commitment to put $10 million worth of paving work on the streets before August 2010. Our engineering staff has started on the first step – a couple of million dollars worth of roadway work we're hoping to have ready and receive funds from the DOT.  And we're getting plans ready for more.

What is the plan for road improvement?
We initiated a pavement management system several years ago. The pavement management system reviews the roadway conditions, which means that it takes a look at the pavement surface, cracks, distortions, openings, and other measures of distress. It runs it through a formula with the traffic on the roadway volumes and we make a determination of what is an appropriate treatment for the roadway, whether it's preventative maintenance, or maybe cracked sealling, or overlay, or a total reconstruction of the roadway (which means removing out all the pavement and putting back a new roadway). So there's really three areas depending on the condition, we'll select one and we'll look for roads that have the highest return value, which are the roads that will impact the most traffic, for the money that we need to spend.

Also in line with this roadway project, last month, the Mayor announced that DPW would undertake an aggressive program to systematically repair potholes in Providence. How is this program going so far?
With the lack of spending on pavement over decades, pavement conditions in this city have become pretty poor. The result is that roads that could have been crack-sealed in the past have now deteriorated so we now have pavement defects, or problem potholes. The solution to a pothole obviously is to make the repair. They freeze and then thaw in the winter and all the moisture that's accumulated from sleet, snow, and rain, all contribute to potholes.

They come out in the spring with crocuses. Spring is pothole season and one of the problems you run into is that they all come out together with the early thaws. You can't typically get good patch material, hot asphalt, in so we get a high performance cold patch, and use what's called a throw-and-roll - which is highly recommended by a major highway research program. It lasts three to five times longer than regular cold patch.

So, we get crews out and we use parks staff to augment the work and sometimes work on Saturdays when we can. Coming now towards the middle of March, the asphalt plan is beginning to open up. A few days a week we're able to get hot asphalt on the ground. Once we get caught up and completed, we'll take the worst of the potholes and actually do a repair to the roadway.

Another goal of your department under Operation Opportunity is to build off on your current recycling program and double the citywide rate. How do you plan to do this?
We know that the city recycling rate is low compared to the rest of the state, and still low compared to what our goal is. But we're now into double digits, around 10.7 percent of our waste is now recycled. So while we're making positive gains, we're still far from where we want to be. And we want to be up over 20 percent. One of the things that they're finding now with this depressed economy is that there's much less waste going out now, and that's a national trend. It appears like people are buying less and throwing away less too.

So, the way to achieve our goal to increase citywide recycling is to have everybody participating in it and that will be through education and process and maybe even changing some of the ways we collect trash. There are a lot of ways to do that, one of them is a no-bin, no-barrel program, where we don't take the trash if you don't recycle. We do need to educate our residents and we're doing that through outreach. We put together a recycling committee which will be meeting over the next month. Everybody needs be thoughtful about what they're putting out in the trash. 

In your opinion, how will all these plans to improve our roads and our trash collection system impact the quality of life for Providence neighbors?
Wherever people are going – whether they're on foot or in a car – they need to get there safely. As far as recycling, it costs taxpayers a lot of money to not recycle. Everywhere you go, people are talking about going green. It's the thing to do and the whole country is heading that way.

What do you like most about your job?
When I first came to the city about four and half years ago, it was a challenge. I think we're making headway. Things are not going as fast as I'd like but we're making incremental improvements. When we talk about Operation Opportunity, we've started the process in house with our staff – designing roadways and we have the capability to do that. We're able to make recycling outreach bilingually and we have someone with the interest and passion to get the job done. So I'm glad to see that we're making solid improvements.

For more on DPW, go to www.providenceri.com/publicworks and for more on the city's recycling program, go to www.providenceri.com/green.

  

 

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