With the recent freeze-thaw going on in Vancouver (albeit a lot more freeze than thaw), the roads have started to disintigrate. Some of the holes that developed were truly shocking. Frustratingly, in a city where bridges form bottlenecks all over, the pot holes were at their worst on a couple of key bridges. A couple of key bridges that are necessary for Ange and I to get to work.
Yesterday's total commuting time crested an incredible 4 hours. Not helping the situation on Oak Street was the abandoned, stalled car in the far left lane ("fast" lane). Either way, it was over an hour to go 3km to get to the bridge, where people gingerly crawled along avoiding holes that would almost certainly swallow a Smart car. I'm sure those in their SUVs were suddenly vindicated. What's more amazing is the government's response time to this problem. Opa and I were commenting on the bridge a week ago. It was only when the state of the bridge became lead-story, provincial news that the Ministry of Transportation became vaguely interested. Now, however, we're all action. There's even a hotline and online form (check it) set up so you can report a pot hole in your 'hood. The online form asks the relevant questions, like "How big is the hole?" but then offers few options, the largest being 'bigger than a dinner plate.' Not that all dinner plates are the same, but 'big enough to swallow a Smart car' indicates they might not have a complete grasp of the situation. At least they give you the opportunity to input "How easy is it to avoid?" with one of the options being 'impossible to avoid' and "How likely is it to damage a car?" with an option that it is 'very likely'.
Not really inspiring any confidence, the City claims that the pot hole situation is no worse than in other years. Perhaps if they place the same resource and urgency on pot-hole filling as they do on snow removal, getting an SUV might be the better option over waiting for the government response.
2 comments:
Not only is the Oak Street bridge wrought with potholes, they are potholes that I have never seen the like of before. In places where potholes develop over the course of a few winters, they are somewhat dish-shaped, with sloping sides. The Oak Street potholes are just collapsed sections of pavement. The road is just suddenly about 20 cm lower in an area about the size of a garbage can lid.
wow, I had no idea it was that newsworthy! I travel the Oak Street bridge daily too, and I was quite pleasantly surprised the other day when they had filled all the holes. And then quite dismayed the next day when the rain had washed half of them back to huge holes again! The worst is driving at night in the rain, when you can't see them at all, and leave the front end of your car to fate :)
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