MOUNT VERNON — The scourge of vehicles keeps rearing its ugly head on nearly every road, helped along by a winter that has been giving Ohio residents whiplash with its changes. What’s a city to do?
“The freezing and thawing – when you have that kind of winter, it’s going to break up roads,” said Mount Vernon Mayor Richard Mavis. “It’s breaking them up everywhere, not just in Mount Vernon.”
Old Man Winter has gleefully dumped inches upon inches of snow on central Ohio, then Mother Nature has stepped in to warm things up a bit – and why not add some rain on top of it? That mixture – snow one week, rain the next – has wreaked havoc on roads and the city’s ability to respond to the ever-increasing number of potholes.
“Rain fills potholes,” Mavis said. “You can’t put any kind of asphalt and expect it to stay if you have water in the pothole.”
The city has turned to its bevy of equipment stored in its garages and pulled out its street sweeper. By turning the brooms off, the sweeper engages the vacuum and sucks water out of the potholes.
On a dry day, the city will use its DuraPatcher, a small paving machine that heats the oil, mixes stone into it, and puts it on the road using a large diameter hose.
“The small cracks – and that’s what we have, we have a lot of those rattling – about an inch or so of asphalt pops up. You put cold mix in that it’s like putting gravel in it,” Mavis said.
The city has been using the DuraPatcher to correct those small areas. Mavis said Tom Hinkle, the city’s street superintendent, reported they used 850 gallons of emulsion and 45 tons of stone in the process.
“Every day that we can get it out, we get it out,” Mavis said. “It takes five men to operate it, though, so it takes a staff to do it. But it does a good job and [a patch] withstands the rest of the winter.”
For the big, deep potholes that seem to creep out of nowhere, Mavis said they’ve used the cold mix option. So far, the city has used four tons of cold mix. “It will stay pretty well because it has depth to it,” Mavis explained.
Despite options available to the city to fix the roads, there is one variable that throws a wrench in their plans every time: weather.
“We’ve been out there, but when it’s raining … you can’t really do much,” Mavis said.
There’s at least one major paving project set that will fix the winter wear and tear. Mavis said U.S. 36 – from West High Street, around the square, to East High Street, North Park Street, and along Coshocton Avenue until it intersects with Upper Gilchrist Road – is slated to be resurfaced this year by the State of Ohio. The city of Mount Vernon will kick in 20 percent of the costs, which amounts to about $500,000. The project date is yet to be determined.
“The State of Ohio said they like to do projects like this every 10 or 12 years. It’s been a little longer than that, but that’s a high traffic area so it breaks up,” Mavis said.
“We’re trying to keep ahead of it, but the way the weather is, people should slow down, try to avoid the potholes.”
The City of Mount Vernon has set up a hotline that allows residents to notify the proper departments of dangerous potholes on the streets. That number is 740-393-9501. Mavis said all that is needed is a nearby address for the location of the pothole. After that, a crew will respond to the call.
“We appreciate people helping us out because a lot of these big potholes are dangerous and will cause damage to your cars,” Mavis said.
