BS: amazing discovery (potholes)

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 08:31 PM

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace - PM
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:26 PM

Just a suggestion: shouldn't this thread be combined with the one entitled "Pot to be decriminalized by 2013"?



I thought so, too.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 08:30 PM

I thot potholes were where pot was grown.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 08:00 PM

TEXAS? That's a State in the USA, right?

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 07:27 PM

Here's another one.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: The Sandman
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 07:27 PM

jeez, what is a Texan pothole like then,arent Texans bigger and better

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 07:25 PM

An average Montreal pothole.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: s&r
Date: 15 Apr 09 - 07:21 PM

Locally pretty well every speed hump is followed by a pothole probably due to the repeated impact of wheels coming off the end of the speed hump.

Stu

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:26 PM

Just a suggestion: shouldn't this thread be combined with the one entitled "Pot to be decriminalized by 2013"?

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Peace
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:22 PM

"We don't have potholes in the US deep south. Ya gotta have paved roads to have potholes."

What are roads?

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Beer
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 08:30 PM

Those are two great pictures.
Adrien

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: heric
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 07:54 PM

There's fish in them .

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 07:42 PM

But, can you fish in them?

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: john f weldon
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 07:19 PM

Geez, what kind of potholes do you have in Harlow?

We have axel-breaking, bone-jarring, muffler-disabling - entire-car-vanishing-forever ones!

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 05:20 PM

Potholes are a minor nuisance if you're driving a car - a lot less of one than "sleeping policemen". But they're potentially lethal for anyone on two wheels.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: bubblyrat
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 10:07 AM

A word of caution---If you were to ask to see a "Cruiser's Stick" in certain parts of Bournemouth,and especially , Brighton,you might well be quite surprised.
       ( I do NOT,of course,speak from personal experience).

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: john f weldon
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:56 AM

Here in Montreal, if you discover a bit of road without a pothole, you make the morning news.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:50 AM

Here in Chelmsford, Essex, UK, if you discover a large pothole you can take photos and measurements and send into the Borough Council office (safe to say you sent copy to local newspapers) and they will (so they claim) go out and repair quite quickly.

Councils are terrified of bad press but I think they really rely on the vigilance of citizens to help them find locate and report the problems.
the problem is ,this,for a pothole to be repaired properly,it has to be done a certain way,it is no good just filling the hole with tar.
here is my understanding of the correct way,the pothole should be cut to a square,so that the whole hole becomes a square,then filled,then the ditches need to be unblocked so that no water runs onto the road.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Beer
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:39 AM

That is the polite word Bobad. I have other words that have been heard by the good lady of the house. She for some reason does not appreciate.
Adrien

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: bobad
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 09:09 AM

In Quebec French, pot holes are called nid-de-poule, or hen's nest.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 08:47 AM

Curiously I have only once in my entire driving career (since September 1965) damaged a car (a tyre only) on a pothole. Every other time I have had time to slow down or dodge - and I don't hang about. I am surprised that this is not the general experience.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 14 Apr 09 - 05:56 AM

Here in Chelmsford, Essex, UK, if you discover a large pothole you can take photos and measurements and send into the Borough Council office (safe to say you sent copy to local newspapers) and they will (so they claim) go out and repair quite quickly.

Councils are terrified of bad press but I think they really rely on the vigilance of citizens to help them find locate and report the problems.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Apr 09 - 05:09 PM

Nothing particularly obvious about cold conditions causing more damage than hot conditions. Road surfaces can be badly affected by heatwaves and drought.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery (potholes)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Apr 09 - 01:38 PM

'phone call to Montreal?

(Western Canadian potholer, can't speak French)

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 13 Apr 09 - 11:54 AM

Newspapers don't only report "news," i.e., new discoveries. Sometimes they report things that have been known a long time by some people, but not everyone. It's a good thing. Do you suppose they teach this kind of thing in school?

*
I live in Minnesota, which is a lot like Wisconsin. While the "heaves" that JohnInKansas describes may be a problem on rural roads, potholes are a much bigger problem in cities. Traffic has a lot to do with creating potholes. Every time a tire runs over a pothole, a bit more asphalt or gravel is broken off or tossed out, so they keep getting wider and deeper, and they sometimes overwhelm the city's ability to repair them promptly. Some years are a lot worse than others, depending on the amount of freezing and thawing that occurs. Preventive maintenance in the summer is also important. You've got to seal those cracks.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: SINSULL
Date: 13 Apr 09 - 08:30 AM

Extreme heat does a number on asphalt roads as well. The expand and buckle. The LIE was shut down in the 90s for major repairs when temperatures caused mountains to form in the roadway.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 12 Apr 09 - 08:28 AM

We've just had E&R done outside our house... the sycamore tree roots are lifting the paving slabs on the pavement (sidewalk) and making them into Affpuddles. (From 'The Meaning of Liff' - an Affpuddle is a deposit of water hiding under a paving slab that pivots, so that when you tread on one corner of the slab, it shoots the water straight up your trouser leg). My walk to the station of a morning will be drier but a lot less adventurous now.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Apr 09 - 01:37 AM

And my recollection from a few years in Wisconsin is that up there the potholes were less a problem than the "heaves" where the paving stays relatively intact but just "wrinkles" and shoves up sort of like "mother nature's speed bump" when the soil under the road freezes and shoves everything up.

An unexpected one on what looks like a perfectly good road can give you a short airborne moment, and even smaller ones can put a dent in your cap if you're not well belted.

Unlike simple potholes, you can't just stuff some more "paving stuff" in and tamp it down. "Excavation and repaving" is about all that can be done (or - sometimes - just a new warning sign for those who pay attention to such things).

John

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 10:26 PM

We don't have potholes in the US deep south. Ya gotta have paved roads to have potholes.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Beer
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 10:11 PM

Agree with you John. Come to Montreal for a few wonderful street adventures. Better yet, when you are visiting make sure you take a drive over the 8th wonder of the World. The "Mercier Bridge". If you have the guts and balls to take the chance and make it over . What a disgrace to the Province of Quebec.
Beer (adrien)

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Peace
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 10:06 PM

FYI, the Biltmore can be made--no need to buy one. Many decades ago when I taught a 'Junior Forest Wardens' program, one of the assignments was to make yer own Biltmore stick. I just found out it is often called a Cruiser's stick.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Peace
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 10:02 PM

He could have used a Biltmore stick and done the same thing.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 12:41 PM

Speaking of bullshit from credible sources, I just read The Wild Trees. Some kid, in the 1990's, loved looking at redwoods, carefully. He looked at "the world's tallest tree," as declared by National Geographic funded expeditions and articles, presidential decrees, and monied interests in California. He made a little surveyor's tool with a plastic protractor and duct tape or whatever, less than $2 worth, and went out and found taller ones.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 12:26 PM

It is fairly amusing as written, but note that the North - South distance is only 4 or 500 miles, which would have been interesting, until you see they didn't even factor in maintenance budgets (or other geographical factors), making the entire thing moot.

If the BBC wants more money sent north, they could do so without appearing ridiculous.

"training and parenting for fruits and vegetables" sounds intriguing and could be highly beneficial in California. I hope it didn't get trashed.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:53 AM

Should mention that the others for whom the pothole size to weather parallel is not obvious are tax paying voters. But more scarily it may be the councillors and members (read inept at best and inbred at worst) make the decisions. If it's coming from the wholesome BBC it must be good, true and right.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:47 AM

Didn't say the research was needed, only that it would be required. That's the way things work around here. Do a study if you want to justify the funding.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:39 AM

The title of some of the stimulus money backed research that is being suggested by scientists are really whacked.

Some that have come acrss my wife's desk are "training and parenting for fruits and vegetables".

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: john f weldon
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:20 AM

The only research needed was a phone call to Montreal.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: GUEST,guest VirginiaTam at different PC
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:15 AM

Ooops! That was me that posted response above.

Subject: RE: BS: amazing discovery
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 11:14 AM

Not very kind John.

It is not exactly common knowledge that sub zero temperatures affects roads. The general public don't think about water under the road and it's effects when it freezes. They only think about ice on top of the road. I only know because I am a documentary and former weather channel geek.

Here there are problems getting potholes seen to.   It is a local responsibility. So councils in northern communities need to find and dedicate more funds to keeping the roads up than do the southern communities. I think the BBC explanation is geared to helping readers understand why more council tax must be dedicated to highways maintenance.   

The title of the article is a bit unfortunate and kind of dumbed down. The research would have been required but it need not have been so obivious.

Subject: BS: amazing discovery
From: john f weldon
Date: 11 Apr 09 - 10:59 AM

This remarkable insight is from a BBC series "Ten things we didn't know yesterday" and tell us that cold weather can affect potholes.

potholes

What will those clever Brits discover next? Ice, when heated, becomes water? Going out in the rain can make you wet?