Omaha neighbors say portion of Bancroft Street in desperate need of paving

OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) - Developers in Omaha decades ago put in streets that won’t meet standards today. The city doesn’t have the tax money to pave them unless adjacent homeowners split the cost.

One of those streets near 48th Avenue and Bancroft is short, so the few neighbors next to it can’t afford the cost.

Surrounded by paved streets, the one block of Bancroft that isn’t has become busy with thrill seekers.

“We see kids on dirt bikes riding down the streets and using this as a motor cross,” said homeowner Cathy Hart. “The ruts are so deep the kids kind of launch themselves off of it.”

Though rough, the single-block stretch of Bancroft is a popular path for all vehicles. In just a half hour cars, pickups, vans and a motorcycle bounced up and down the substandard street.

“Especially if you are on a motorcycle you can spin out and dump it,” one motorcyclist said.

The city sets aside $6 million a year to pave substandard streets if a majority of adjacent property owners agree to split the cost.

“We have an unimproved street policy where the city pays 50% of the design and construction of those streets,” Omaha City Engineer Todd Pfitzer said. “So that is the only avenue that we have at this time.”

But only four homeowners live along this block.

“My husband and I are retired, the other neighbors are retired, it would just be outrageous for us to have to cover that.”

Cathy Hart believes improving the block doesn’t benefit just four homeowners, but all Omaha taxpayers who pay now for grading and filling with asphalt grindings.

But it seems the least expensive way to try and smooth over that one block stretch of unimproved Bancroft has interfered with a more costly government project.

Handicap ramps put in a few years ago are now covered with the aggregate that has washed down.

Rick Brown lives at the bottom of the hill.

“It’s dangerous because we have bicyclists and motorcyclists, and you have that gravel in the road,” Brown said.

Another neighbor, Ernie Taylor, says the costs of maintaining a substandard street and paving it could eventually be a wash.

“You’re wasting a lot more time, just constantly coming and cleaning this up when it rains. Just pave it one time and be down with it,” Taylor said.

The substandard street is graded twice a year, according to the city.

“When it’s on a grade it’s difficult to handle when you get heavy rains, it does move that material around,” Pfitzer said. “That’s why these streets are so undesirable.”

While Public Works does what it can within cost limits to maintain the substandard street, neighbors say the results flow downhill.

The district boundary for two city council members runs right down the middle of the unimproved street.

Councilmembers Danny Begley and Vinny Palermo sent a joint statement that they are working with Public Works and with the money in the budget to advocate for this road being added to the replacement list.

Begley also informed public works of the debris build-up at the bottom of the block.

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