Potholes are back for another season, and the damage they cause could cost you
About '600 incidents' a year come in related to pothole damage,' says one Fredericton garage
On the evening of March 27, Jeffrey Balcombe was on Sainte Anne's Point Drive in Fredericton, driving under the Westmorland Street Bridge, when he hit a pothole.
"As I switched lanes just underneath the overpass there, I hit a big bump and I was just hoping that nothing big was broken," said Balcombe.
He was able to drive home across the bridge to the city's north side, all the while wondering what he would find once he could get home and inspect the damage.
"I kept driving, noticed a few little bumps, got home, saw the tire was flat, went to the gas station to fill it up and then that's when I noticed the dent."
In addition to the flat tire, the wheel itself was damaged, which cost Balcombe $113 to repair.
"With property tax, the power bill going up, the gas bill going up — it's not an expense I want to have right now," he said.
Balcombe, who is from Ontario but has lived in Fredericton for more than two years, said this winter has been the worst for potholes, but then he finds road conditions generally "lacklustre at best."
"It seems like they're working in the same spots every year and they never actually fix it."
He said that his regular route to work takes him toward Maugerville on Route 105, which is a provincial road.
"This morning driving, I was thinking I'd rather be driving on a dirt road than some of the sections, especially just past the Princess Margaret Bridge," he said. "That road is terrible."
He's not alone in his frustration about road conditions.
Camden Sutherland, a service advisor at S/S Tire and Auto Service in downtown Fredericton, has worked there for more than a decade and says the shop does repairs daily on pothole-damaged cars.
"We're looking at somewhere around 600 incidents" a year from pothole damage, said Sutherland.
He said during peak pothole season the garage could see up to 10 vehicles a day.
Repairs can be as simple as an inexpensive tire patch, or the more costly fix of a whole new tire, but some damage can run much higher.
"You're looking at stuff like front-end suspension components," Sutherland said. "It can [cost] thousands of dollars."
Cause and effect
Potholes occur after cycles of freezing and thawing, said Mike Walker, the assistant director of engineering and operations for the City of Fredericton.
"When any water gets inside any crack, any hole, any susceptible soils underneath — when it freezes, expands — weakens it even more.
"As soon as traffic starts hitting that, those weakened soils weaken asphalt and end up breaking up."
Walker said that with the current climate, those freeze/thaw cycles can happen daily.
In the winter, there is not much that can be done to properly repair the holes, he said. The city uses cold-patch asphalt for a temporary fix, but Walker said hot asphalt, which they can only get in the summer months, is the best solution.
Balcombe would like to see the city and the province get pothole repairs "right the first time."
Walker said the only way "to do it right" would be to "rebuild the entire road."
That is time consuming so, instead the city focuses on patching holes as they appear.
They look for holes that have reached the "granular material" beneath the asphalt to fix first. Walker said that when the top layer of asphalt is "peeled off," the city is not looking to fix those but, they will if they can.
The city doesn't look after the stretch of road where Balcombe's car was damaged, it's under provincial jurisdiction.
For provincial roads, the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure said, "Any repairs made before May are typically only temporary patches, using lighter material than the asphalt employed during warmer months."
Both the City of Fredericton and the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure have a phone line for motorists to report issues.
The city's website says people can report potholes by calling 506-460-2020 "or by submitting concerns via social media." The Government of New Brunswick says to contact thw "Transportation Information Centre at 1-833-384-4111 or email [email protected]."
The city said, in an emailed statement, that they "have received reports of potholes this spring but are not seeing an increase in calls compared to previous years."
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