It’s that lovely time of year where the temperatures start to rise…then fall… then rise again but overall we start to see the average temperature creep its way back up. That lovely time of year where the snow on the road is melting and the potholes begin to show themselves. If you’ve recently found yourself dodging way more potholes than you remember seeing in the fall you’re not alone.
There are many ways a pothole can form, overall age of the pavement, poor drainage, and just overall traffic use are just some of them. But by far the worst offender here in Canada is Mother Nature herself. We’ve been lucky… or unlucky to have a relatively mild winter this year, a few big snowstorms but even just compared to the previous years the snow hasn’t lasted as long. But that is exactly the problem causing the sudden rise in Potholes.
If you take a glass of water and you freeze it, chances are that glass will break. As water freezes it expands, it will then retract when it thaws later on. When you have a road that has suffered any amount of cracks due to traffic, eventually water will seep into those cracks, and when temperatures drop the water expands, filling all those cracks and applying pressure to the already vulnerable pavement. Add on the weight of the daily commute, trucks and more and those weak pieces break off and when the snow melts a pothole is born.
How are the potholes in your area?
