SALT LAKE CITY — Salt Lake City crews are wrapping up the third annual "Pothole Palooza," a weeklong effort to inspect every city-owned road and repair thousands of potholes. The city has filled about 3,500 potholes this year.
"We have a really good crew who are constantly addressing potholes all year round, but during Pothole Palooza, about 50% of our staff is purely focused on potholes, so we pull them off of their other duties," Julie Crookston said.
The concentrated effort serves multiple purposes for the city's infrastructure. "One is to address the potholes after the winter, because there's usually more after our winter," Crookston said. "This year it's a bit lighter of a winter, so maybe not as many, but it also preps our roads for the other maintenance we do during the summer season. So whether it's striping or some surface treatments, if we have those potholes repaired, that maintenance goes smoother."
Potholes are created when water seeps into the roadway, either getting under the surface or pooling on top.
"During the winters we get freeze, and then it thaws, and then it freezes again, that's kind of what creates potholes," Crookston said. "Wear and tear of the road also creates potholes, so that can happen in the summer even without the freezing and thawing cycle."
Crews use specific materials to make the repairs as permanent as possible.
"We'll do hot asphalt or a material called cold patch, and our crews are really experienced," Crookston said. "They do a really good job. They try to provide as permanent a fix as possible. Sometimes potholes do continue to reoccur in the same area, but as we receive requests, we go out and respond to them and fill them."
The milder winter weather resulted in fewer road repairs compared to previous years. "Last year we filled about 5,900," Crookston said. "And this year it's been closer to like 3,500, so that is just an effort of, you know, an effect of that lighter winter that we had, but we've still inspected every road, so we know that, you know, we've done our part in inspecting all the roads for the potholes."
Unfilled potholes can cause property damage and create hazards for drivers and bicyclists.
"That's one of the reasons we do try to address them as quickly as possible because they can cause real damage to people's property," Crookston said. "Depending on them, they could cause you to swerve into another lane, which is obviously a big safety concern, or you know if they're in the bike paths, they can cause problems for bikers, so they are a safety issue as well as other concerns."
Residents can report potholes year-round through the city's website, SLC.gov, or the MySLC app. "As soon as we receive the request, we'll respond to it within about 24 hours throughout the entire year," Crookston said. "So we're constantly filling potholes. This is just an extra special effort in the spring."
The city also conducts a roadway health analysis every five years, assigning scores to prioritize repairs from "worst first."
"More potholes in a row definitely lowers that score of that road, and we have a few different tools we can do a surface treatment for the entire road, but if there's just like a smaller section, we can come out and do just a repair on that section that's a more permanent repair than a pothole," Crookston said. "So we're constantly analyzing is this just a pothole repair for now or is it one of our bigger repairs that we need to do."
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