By Tara Fischer

Staff Writer

(July 16, 2026) The Town of Berlin will pursue a scaled-back paving project in the Henry’s Mill community after discovering that repairing the entire roadway would cost the municipality far more than originally anticipated.

The initiative was presented at Monday night’s Berlin Town Council meeting.

The town had initially intended to repave all of Henry’s Mill Drive using carryover funds from the 2026 street-paving budget after other scheduled projects were delayed due to aging water and sewer infrastructure that still needed replacement.

The idea was to address sections of Henry’s Mill Drive that had buckled, making the street unsafe for motorists.

The plan came to a halt when public works found irregularities in the Henry’s Mill roadway. Testing of the showed that the street was built on unstable material.

“We had some testing done, and then when we did, we found the ground underneath was not solid,” Berlin Public Works Director Jimmy Charles said. “It’s like walking on the beach near the water. If you step on it, it’s always mushy … to do the street correctly, it doubled in price, and we don’t have that in our funds.”

Instead, Berlin will address the road’s most bothersome areas and allocate the remaining 2026 carryover funds to other, less costly streets around town that require repair and maintenance.

The Henry’s Mill sections slated for repair include: 5 Henry Mill Drive, an 85-foot by 26-foot area; the Littleworth Road and Henry’s Mill Drive intersection, 70 feet by 27 feet; 105 Henry’s Mill Drive, 70 feet by 26 feet; and Penders Lane and Henry’s Mill Drive, 23 feet by 14 feet.

At each location, contractors will remove the damaged pavement, excavate six inches of unstable material, install a new stone base, and rebuild the road with 3.5 inches of new asphalt, consisting of a 2-inch base layer topped with a 1.5-inch surface layer.

Berlin Mayor Zack Tyndall maintained that while the project will improve the road’s conditions, it remains a temporary remedy.

“It’ll buy us time, but it’s not a long-term solution,” he said. “It will reoccur again, but this will help us buy some time.”

Councilman Jack Orris asked Charles when the town can expect the entirety of Henry’s Mill to be repaved. The public works director responded that he can’t provide specifics, and for now, he and his team are monitoring the roadway.

“Other parts of the road were in fair or good condition, not to the point where they need to be resurfaced like the areas we’re addressing,” Charles said. “We don’t have the funding to do the whole road today…the road could last for years…we’re watching, we’re maintaining it.”

Debbie Ritz, president of Henry’s Mill homeowner’s association, noted the areas slated for repair are “awful.”

“We’ve been dealing with this,” she said. “Are we going to continue to be in bad shape? Every year, is something going to be going on?”

Charles said that the goal of the project is to maintain the roads as effectively as possible, but public works must work within the confines of available funding.

“If we have another winter, some areas could expose themselves, or they could be solid for a while,” he said.

Tyndall added that the issue predates current town leadership.

“The way the road was constructed is leading to some of these problems,” he said. “So, we’re not able to fix the entire roadway…we don’t have the funding to be able to do that.”

After the discussion, the Town Council voted unanimously to direct municipality staff to issue a request for proposals for construction contractors.