THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, February 11, 1996 TAG: 9602110043
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAC DANIEL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
They are deep, wet menaces; gritty, abrupt hazards that bottom out toward the Earth's core along our formerly ice-gripped streets.
With this week's temperatures rising and the blasted ice gone, experts say we're in for a holey mess. The first of a million potholes, folks, are drawing near.
The problem apparently won't be as bad as 1994, a record-setting year for street cavities. State transportation officials then said they hadn't seen as many potholes in 17 years.
Things were so bad that Norfolk moved up its annual ``pothole month'' from April to March. That year, city workers filled in exactly 25,097 potholes.
Crews on the Peninsula worked 10-hour shifts. State officials needed an extra $800,500 to help repair that year's winter wear.
At the time, Roy Hale, Virginia Beach's street maintenance superintendent for the past 34 pothole-filled years, called some of the potholes ``monsters.''
Last winter offered a reprieve. This winter likely will not, though officials from the Virginia Department of Transportation say they don't expect anything out of the ordinary - but they have begun patching. And this week was classic pothole-making weather - ice, snow and an abrupt rise and fall in temperature.
Some potholes were starting to appear in the center lane of Interstate 464 near the Poindexter Street exit, waiting for a tire like a fly trap waits for flies. Another monster was spotted at the base of a ramp leading to the Berkley Bridge.
But don't look for too many depressions now. Most of the holes haven't popped to the surface yet. At the present time - like plumbing and politics - there's a lot going on below the surface.
When melting snow and ice saturate asphalt and then freeze, moisture expands the pavement. And when the pavement thaws and contracts, it crumbles. When you drive over it on your way home, that little patch of road erodes with you. Then the guy behind you drives over it. And after a while, you've got yourself a pothole.
The state spends nearly $11 million making temporary and permanent repairs to more than 1 million potholes a year. In 1994, the state patched and spent three times those amounts.
Your bushings will take a beating, auto mechanics say. Your shocks are in for a start.
``It's just an ongoing thing,'' said Andy Barnard, maintenance operations manager for the VDOT. ``We're probably in better shape than we've been in quite a while. A few sections of interstate are pothole problems, but all of those areas are under contract to be repaired in March. So we just keep on keeping on.''
Norfolk's pothole hotline has yet to really start ringing, but Bobby Whitney, the asphalt team coach, is readying for the worst.
``This past week and a half is going to definitely have an effect on the potholes we're seeing today,'' he said. ``I'm expecting a year similar to what we had last year. The last two years have been the toughest that the asphalt repair teams have faced.
``Right now, we're gearing up for it,'' he said, adding that he plans to have four teams of two to three people working strictly on potholes. ``We've got to be ready for them.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot
Officials from the Virginia Department of Transportation say they
already have begun to patch potholes such as this one at the
intersection of Ballentine and Chesapeake boulevards in Norfolk.
Graphic
KEN WRIGHT/The Virginian-Pilot
HOW POTHOLES ARE FORMED
SOURCE: The Virginian-Pilot Archives
[For complete graphic, please see microfilm] by CNB