Asphalt is cheaper to install, and easier to repair, than cement concrete. But both require regular maintenance to ward off deterioration – including potholes. According to the Federal Highway Administration (FWHA), about 94 percent of all surfaces used for transportation – roads, streets, and highways – are paved with asphalt. The characteristics and properties of bitumen-based asphalt, also known as blacktop, are quite different than those of concrete, even if…
Why aren’t there any driveways in pictures of middle class homes from the 1890s? Because they didn’t have cars! The rest is history. Before anyone considers their next blacktop driveway repair project, it might help to consider the history of driveways themselves. As well as the old jokey question, “Why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways?” The answer to that question is simple: language evolves. The invention…
No driveway lasts forever. But just like with human health, the wellbeing of asphalt pavement depends on attentive maintenance: resealing, resurfacing, and ultimately repaving. New homeowners learn a hard lesson, gradually, as the home and its surroundings age and deteriorate. It depends on the components of the house, garage, driveway, and landscaping elements – especially the quality of materials and products – but with time a new roof, new paint,…
The 2021 US infrastructure bill leapt closer to becoming law in August with a strong vote of support from the Senate. So what might it mean for pothole repair? The obvious benefit of the $1.2 trillion Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework (a working title) is in how much will be dedicated to fixing roads and bridges. While a version of the bill has yet to be voted on in the House, and…
Potholes from freezing weather aren’t the only thing that can go wrong with asphalt and concrete roads. The lessons from heat dome regions should be part of engineering, policy, and infrastructure planning. There are two misperceptions about road pavement that could be increasingly problematic in the years to come. They are: All asphalt is made the same (it’s not) The only threats to roads are the freeze-thaw cycles that cause…
The national ironman triathlon championship race is in Oklahoma this month. But just three months after harsh winter storms, literal potholes must be fixed. When cities host triathlons, marathons, criterions, and other mass outdoor athletic events, it’s a smart draw for those municipalities to welcome visitors. The athletes and their families and friends often spend a weekend – as well as their tourist dollars at hotels, restaurants, and local attractions….
A bump in the road can be deadly to bikers, motorcyclists, scooter riders, and anyone in 2-wheeled vehicles. The need to fill potholes is greater than ever. The British magazine Cycling Weekly, in a concession to the poor quality of many roads in the UK, offered up an article in 2017 on how to bicycle safely in the presence of potholes. Among several techniques, one suggestion was to “bunnyhop,” a…
“Improve the condition of the roads. Apart from it leading to accidents and deaths, now we hear from health experts that it is leading to dengue and malaria.”
Where water flows to is where pavement is most likely to fail. So in areas where water stands still there may well be potholes lurking under the puddles. In the balance of life, there are bridges and there are underpasses. On the former a car will go up and over and the latter it’s down and through. Simple stuff, right? It also explains why, simply, there tend to be potholes…
Injurious falls occur more often outside the home than in. Artists in Chicago are filling potholes with bicycle parts – perhaps reducing pothole dangers. In this particularly cold and miserable winter of 2021, after the snow is sufficiently scraped or melted away from the streets of Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood, there are some filled-in potholes from late 2020 that should get more attention than road repairs typically do. That’s because…
It appears road maintenance, which should mean fixing small cracks before they become deadly potholes, will be prioritized.
Potholes cause costly damage to car wheels, suspension and steering systems. Tire blowouts are most common, but tougher new tire material offers better protection. Is there such a thing as a pothole-proof car tire? One Finnish company believes it can be done – so much so they are introducing a very resilient product in North America made of the same material as used in bulletproof vests. It comes with an…
Since the early 20th century, markings and reflectors have helped guide our way and keep us safe while driving. Too bad potholes don’t come with such warnings. While it’s commonplace today to see yellow and white lines, and different colored reflectors, embedded in our streets and highways, that hasn’t always been the case. The first painted lines down the middle of roads – in Wayne County, Michigan in 1911 –…
We are conducting a national survey to identify people’s thoughts and experiences with potholes. Your opinion matters so we invite you to participate.
While airplane and cruise line travel are way down due to the coronavirus, travel by cars is almost exactly where it was in 2019. Better roads help.
Where people work may be permanently affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. What does that mean for commuters, the roads they travel – and pothole repairs? In February 2020 the TRIP organization, a surface transportation research non-profit, released a study that found traffic in northern Virginia costs commuting drivers $2,600 per year due to congestion, vehicle maintenance from rough pavement, and crashes. The cumulative costs of these to all drivers in…
Tactile Mobility is building a platform for cars and trucks to monitor road quality. Motorists, fleets, and DOTs to get real-time data on bumps in the road. Where it comes to the future of surface transportation – the ways and means to travel and transport on roads, streets and highways – it’s clear that engineers and technologists are working overtime. So many innovations are afoot: roads with embedded solar panels…
Among the many effects of the coronavirus pandemic response is how urban traffic is down sharply. That makes road repairs easier now – but future use and funding are in doubt.
This data suggests that, given how road quality affects all vehicles – regardless of whether they are traditional internal combustion engines or electric driven – that ensuring better pavement, including that which is pothole-free, offers an environmental as well as financial benefit to motorists and commercial freight haulers.
So what are the current innovations driving toward smarter, longer-lasting asphalt? What can make our tax dollars stretch further? How can our roads be safer, and less likely to inflict damage to our cars, trucks, and buses?
British motorists seem to honor, dubiously, potholes more than we do in America. It’s not like US motorists suffer car damages any less from bad pavement.
LVL5’s “Pavdar” system – recording smartphone video from dashboards – may be the future of pothole detection. Already, it knows Michigan roads are the worst. It’s very hard to get a national, state or even citywide count of potholes on our streets and highways. Which is problematic in two ways: To repair them, first you have to know where they are. Second, to budget for those repairs, you have to…
Monte Scott is just the latest to fill those craters with his own initiative. Meanwhile, the state’s governor and legislature mull a huge gas tax increase. When both his mother and grandmother got flat tires on their cars from potholes on their street in late March, 12-year-old Monte Scott took matters into his own hands. He got a shovel, a barrel (without wheels) and some dirt, then filled in a…
This is the time of year when potholes naturally plague driving everywhere. After some crazy weather patterns, 2019 is turning out to be a doozie, according to NPR and many tweets. As winter turns to spring, roads turn to battlefields – and the Spring of 2019 is no exception. After a relatively mild early winter the majority of America’s Midwest and Northeast was dealt with the “bomb cyclone” in March…
The conference itself, held in Indianapolis, achieved its goals. But attendees noticed something before they got to the convention center: Lots of potholes. Every two years the asphalt industry gathers for the “World of Asphalt Show & Conference,” a confab of more than 450 of the paving industry’s leading manufacturers and service providers. The convention is always held in a North American city, providing a chance for people in the…
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