Pothole rant
 

Is it just me, or are potholes worse than ever before this year? It's worse than some third-world countries I've been to.

It's not just you. Long, hard winter + budget cuts = crappy roads.

When pothole "repair" is done with cool asphalt and shovels, as it's done in Chicago, it's not really helping much (except create more jobs for pothole pluggers). It's not corruption; it's job creation through infrastructure work.

The situation is bad enough that people are starting to fix their own streets.

Yup. They throw some gunk in the hole, and an hour later, after a few cars drive over it, the hole is back almost as it was before. Useless.

I watched pothole patching in Eugene, Ore, this winter. Hot asphalt and a steam roller, in 3 or 4 minutes the road looked brand new. But Chicago follows the old Italian proverb: "he who screws up and has to do it over again is never idle".

It's a lot warmer in Eugene in the winter then it is here.

One of the worst extended stretches I have found is a middle lane on Cicero, going south from MDW.

Must be thousands of holes, and it feels like my car will shake apart..

also noticed that potholes this year seem to be more severe under overpasses.

For instance, Higgins/Oakton Rd under I-90 (in front of the UA building) is terrible, the cab drivers driving me to ORD drive on alternate roads now.

True, and they get very few potholes. Still doesn't explain why their patching method is to restore the road surface to like-new, and ours is to toss some loose cold patch in the hole, such that by the next day it's almost as bad as it was prior to patching.

The situation is actually worse after patching, since the stuff they put in the hole gets forced out by passing cars, and then accumulated in front of the hole. Now you have a hole AND a bump. Really, really sorry situation all around.

Because hot patch doesn't adhere when the ground is below a certain temperature. That occurs a hell of a lot more often here then in Eugene.

Wow, that's pretty bad.

Hey, the sign says, "Repairs coming this summer." I agree that it's horrible. I've found that going eastbound, the best to do is hug the curb in the left lane as that is area least damaged.

Some other bad spots in that area:
Oakton eastbound just west of Elmhurst Road.
Rte 83 right lane from about Thorndale to I-290.

I just drove by that minefield area on Higgins under I-90. It looks like they finally are doing the repairs. The westbound lanes have new pavement. The Eastbound lanes have the rough groved surface in preparation for the new pavement which actually makes it driveable since all the rough patches have been sucked up.

I got an email from the alderman's office (48th ward - essentially Edgewater neighborhood) stating that 25% of the streets in the ward would be resurfaced this summer (stimulus money mainly). That is good news - the bad news is that about 75% of the streets need to be repaved.

What I find interesting is that the catch basins this year have been particularly prone to caving in - creating huge craters in the gutters. I don't recall it this bad in previous years.

I hit one of those Sunday afternoon over on North Ave under the Kennedy. Felt like I had done some serious damage to the car.