Regulation Considered for Newly Built Roads Within Fayette County

Fayette County Commissioners Court met last Thursday and considered a proposal requiring real estate developers to post a maintenance bond when building new roads in the County.

Fayette County subdivision regulations require newly-subdivided lots to have exclusive access to a public road. The rule prevents developers from creating “landlocked” tracts of properties. As a result, developers must divide properties in a way so that each tract borders a public road, or they can opt to build new public roads within the subdivision. Those roads must be built to the County’s specifications.

The County’s subdivision regulations currently stipulate a one-year warranty period for new roads. During this period, the developer is responsible for maintaining the road. If the road fails during that time, the developer is responsible for repairing it to the satisfaction of the Commissioner responsible for that precinct. The County then takes over maintenance of the road at the end on the warranty period.

Pct. 4 Commissioner Drew Brossmann raised a concern about this arrangement back in December. Brossmann said the warranty period works well when a subdivision gets developed quickly. The new road sees heavy traffic from home construction. If the road can hold up to traffic from cement trucks, Brossmann said, then it should hold up to normal traffic once the subdivision is complete.

“When you build a road and everything looks great, you still don’t know until you get some heavy traffic on it,” Brossmann said Sometimes, however, the one-year warranty period expires before any home construction takes place in the subdivision.

At a meeting two weeks ago, Commissioners discussed a plan to extend the warranty period until some percentage of the tracts in a subdivision are developed. At Thursday’s meeting, County Inspector Clint Sternadel said such a policy would impose a large record-keeping burden on the County. Instead, he proposed a maintenance bond that would be paid by the developer.

“If the developer walks away, we would have some funds as the County to make repairs,” said Pct. Commissioner Jason McBroom.

Commissioners voted unanimously to give Sternadel 60 days to develop a plan for implementing a maintenance bond requirement on new County roads.