By Mindy Ragan Wood
Staff Writer
Residents along Mustang Road and Edmond Road are in an uproar about the damage caused by oil field traffic.
Trucks traveling to and from an oil well site on Edmond Road left mud clods so thick and large that Canadian County sheriff deputies had to direct traffic around the debris.
“They (Red Bluff oil company) did get that cleaned up,” City Manager Jason Orr said.
“They’ve been working well with us to make some repairs on Mustang Road. They’ve made the repair for patching themselves and graded Cemetery Road.”
Councilman John Brown said he received five phone calls that afternoon when the clods were obstructing the road.
“We got it done the next day. They graded it the next morning, kind of shoved it off but then people couldn’t get in their driveways,” he said. “The following day that had been cleared. We’ve still got to deal with Mustang Road.”
Brown and Orr said the maintenance will continue.
“We took pictures of the road before they started,” Brown said. “Before the trucks came through and we will make them return it to the condition it was in before. It was not perfect, but they have damaged the road and they will be required to put that back.”
Mustang Road was already in bad condition and so are many of the other roads in Piedmont. Orr said the city raised the permit fee for oil and gas companies to $14,000 but they can only go so far.
“That’s the most we felt we could ask for without being forced into litigation,” Orr said.
“That’s consistent with what other municipalities charge. There’s not a whole lot municipalities can do and it’s one of the many ways Oklahoma is screwing over municipalities.”
Despite having a larger road budget this year, Brown said it didn’t even make a dent.
“We spent the most this year on roads than we ever have, $900,000 and it didn’t even make a dent. It costs $230,000 to do one mile of road,” he said.
