Thursday, June 11, 2015

AUSTIN AND OTHER TEXAS CITIES OVERWHELMED WITH POTHOLES FROM MAY’S FLOODING










WEDNESDAY, JUNE 10 2015

AUSTIN, TEXAS

May's heavy rains are creating a flood of potholes. 

New ones are forming and old ones are getting bigger. 

The growing problem has the City of Austin getting a deluge of 3-1-1 calls to come fix city streets. 

The Taylor Harrison the timing couldn't have been worse. "Literally the day I moved here everything was under water," said Harrison. 

The skies opened and smacked Austin with the wettest May on record. "Mother Nature is a rager," said Harrison. 

Three weeks ago she moved to the edge of Pease Park. Closer to Shoal Creek, the flood damage is piled high on the curb. But head up Kingsbury Street, where water crept into every crack and crevice, and Harrison is dealing with deep damage. 

"I call them axle breakers," said Harrison. "They used to be sort of ruts down there and now they're just like scoops out of the road." The heavy rains created several new potholes on Kingsbury Street that are bigger than an extra-large pizza. Drivers try to avoid them, but when they can't the road gets rocky. 

To level it out, city crews have used more asphalt mix this year than in all of 2014. "It's just magnified," said Mike Collier, a supervisor with the city's Street and Bridge Operation. 

During the last fiscal year, that ran from October 1, 2013 to September 30, 2014, the city got 1264 requests to fill potholes. So far this fiscal year that number has almost doubled to 2490. "I think we got hit pretty evenly all the way across town," said Collier. Road conditions are anything but typical. 

On a normal day Austin's street repair crews get 20 to 30 pothole calls. "When the storm came in we received about six times as many as that," said Collier.
Potholes are popping up everywhere. For Taylor Harrison, the rains turned her street into an obstacle course. "I try to avoid them, but sometimes it's hard," said Harrison. 

City crews are hoping to smooth out the rest of Austin's flood damage over the summer.