Potholes, manholes and our crumbling roads.

Don't blame it on the sunshine, don't blame it on the moonlight, don't blame it on the goodtimes, blame it on the .........ICE.

We have all heard the excuses during the last few months. The extreme winter weather has caused havoc with roads all over the country and especially in and around London. Since the snow fell and turned into ice, the roads have rapidly deteriorated and have been turned into potential deathtraps. For both motorists and cyclists alike it is more than irritating, it is damn right dangerous and the situation is getting worse.

With the ice and water creeping into the cracks and crevices, the roads are becoming hazardous and getting around is proving quite a challenge. The motorist and the cyclist face different challenges of course, but nontheless, both serious and real. This is even more of a challenge at night and when it's been raining heavily, as is the case in recent weeks, with a heavy downpour, the deep potholes suddenly disappear and take on the guise of innocent looking puddles, which can prove very dangerous indeed.

Sunken manholes, crumbling tarmac - the potholes are causing a huge problem and are costing hundreds of thousands of pounds, both in repairs and in compensation claims.

    

 

How does the snow and ice cause potholes?

The freezing and thawing of the road surface lifts the road material up making cracks in the surface.

The cracks formed to fill with water which feezes and expands the cracks wider.

The thawing water washes the broken material out of the cracks.

Cars traveling the road hit the small cracks and jump up and down breaking up more surface material.

As the holes grow the bumping gets more severe, breaking more surface.

Potholes can appear from nowhere and as a cyclist, it can not only damage your wheels, especially if your on a road bike, but it can, if the pothole is deep or acute enough, cause you to come off your bike. In the dark and wet this would make the situation even more hazardous. 

 

 

So who or what is to blame?  

Well, the local councils will point to the weather. They will say this big freeze, the worst in 30 years, has been responsible for the condition of the roads. The water has crept its way into the cracks and crevices and then as it has frozen it has pushed up the road. Fair, point, and this has definatley been a contributing factor, but do not let them blame all these potholes on the weather. If the roads had been in a better state in the first place then the situation would not be quite so bad. If potholes were repaired properly and promptly then they would have held up better to the recent wet and icy conditions.

All the photos you see here are from a small part of my journey from Camberwell up to the Elephant & Castle on the Walworth Road. I was going up to the E&C to take a photograph of a huge pothole that had been concerning me for a few weeks. (see photograph below). Infact i reported it online last week (21 Feb 2010), but it appears that it has now finally been repaired. It does not look much now it has been repaired, but it was at least 8 inches deep and a few foot across and was on the corner of one of the exits off the roundabout. Swinging wide to avoid this would have put a cyclist in danger from surrounding traffic. How long this repair will last is yet to be seen.

Who do they affect?  

The more potholes, the bigger they are, the more dangerous to both motorist and cyclist alike. Motorists will try to swerve to avoid them, putting both cyclist and pedsetrians at risk. Cyclists could put themselves at risk and could end up in the path of a vehicle.

  

 

What is being done about it?

Councils are asking people to report the potholes they find on their journeys so they can keep up-to-date records as to where they are and do something about it. The sooner they know about them, the sooner they can be repaired. So don't just talk about it, do something and report the potholes as soon as you see them.

 

Impact with pothole edges or sunken grates can cause severe tyre damage which could lead to dangerous blow-outs on the road for both motorist and cyclist. Often a motorist or cyclist will not spot a pothole until it is too late and they either swerve out of the way, which could result in a crash, or cause damage to their car.

• Potholes are a major factor in causing axle & suspension failure, which counts for a third of mechanical issues on UK roads and costs British motorists an estimated £2.8 billion every year.
• Authorities currently pay out more than £50 million in compensation claims due to poor roads
• Road maintenance in England and Wales is underfunded by around 50%, or £1 billion every year.
• At current maintenance levels, the average frequency for a road to be resurfaced in England is once every 65 years. In Wales it is once every 81 years.
• If all authorities were given the budgets they need to fix their roads, it would take English authorities 11 years to catch up with the current backlog, and Welsh authorities 16 year.

Data used is from Warranty Direct, and from the Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) report 2008, published by the Asphalt Industry Alliance, April  2, 2008.  http://www.asphaltindustryalliance.com/alarm.asp

The Walworth Road has recently undergone road resurfacing. Something that was done before the big chill and took a while to complete. Yet, the surface is already showing signs of cracking, and this less than a few months after it was completed. The photos below just show a few of the cracks and holes that have started to appear already.

 

  

The Cost: The cost of the damage to South London roads caused by this winter’s big freeze could already be huge, according to the AA. AA president Edmund King said:  “We believe that emergency cash is required to stop crumbling roads costing more in compensation, accident claims and hospital admissions.”

Nearly 2,500 potholes each were filled in by London Councils last year on average at a cost of £71 per job. Furthermore last year, £3.1million of compensation was also paid out in the capital to people injured or suffering property damage as a result of the holes. According to a recent annual local authority road maintenance survey, there are currently more than one million potholes across the country, but there is a shortfall in the budgets needed to fix them of over £1 billion and an 11-year backlog of maintenance work.

According to Warranty Direct, Britain's badly maintained roads are costing drivers an average of £2.8 million a year in vehicle repairs.

• Half of UK drivers claim to have had a near miss or a crash while swerving to avoid a pothole. A further half of motorists surveyed by GEM (formerly The Guild of Experienced Motorists) say that their cars have been damaged by potholes, although only five per cent have made a claim for compensation against the local authority.
• The survey reports a huge rise in the number of potholes following the spate of bad weather in the UK, leading to an estimated £100 million repair backlog. But GEM points out that 78 per cent of motorists never bother to report the location of new potholes to their local authority.
• Meanwhile 90 per cent of drivers accuse local councils of failing to do enough to repair weather-damaged roads.

Local councils need to take swift action to address this problem but it is also important for motorists to play their part in reporting potholes to local councils. Potholes are not just a nuisance, they are a massive road safety hazhard.

Below are some of the links to websites that deal with pothole reporting:

Fixmystreet.com or the 

www.fillthathole.org.uk

www.potholes.co.uk

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndCommunity/WhereYouLive/RoadsAndStreets/DG_10026187

Also you can report a main road pothole call Transport for London on 0845 305 1234. For other roads call Southwark on 020 7525 2000.

On a lighter note perhaps we should take a note out of this photographers book. 

http://www.mypotholes.com