Prime pothole time

Don't get upset with Randy Frost for being happy — or at least conflicted — about Omaha's potholes.

Frost's Benson business — Wheel Tech, which repairs and refinishes damaged aluminum alloy wheels — has been about twice as busy as normal this year because of the street conditions and the damage inflicted on people's rims.

With the long-term forecast calling for temperatures to top freezing during the day and dip into the teens or low 20s at night, Omaha-area residents can expect to see perfect conditions for potholes to form. And as anybody who drives around town would know, potholes can form in less-than-perfect conditions.

On downtown sidewalks early Friday afternoon, you already could see water trickling off the snow piled along walkways — and the air temperature hadn't yet risen to 32 degrees Fahrenheit. (It was 34 by 4 p.m.)

We haven't had much of a thaw-freeze cycle lately. The last time it topped 32 in Omaha was Feb. 18, when the high was 37. And the temperature has hit or topped 40 degrees on only four days since Dec. 1, which is a record, said Rick Chermok, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Valley.

The prospect of a period of perfect pothole production doesn't make Scott McIntyre too perky.

“I try not to think about that,” said McIntyre, Omaha's street maintenance engineer.

Friday alone, city officials had received 150 pothole complaints by midafternoon, McIntyre said. Pothole crews are out 24 hours a day (two 12-hour shifts), six days a week, but they're having to return to patch the patches on high-volume streets, he said.

“The traffic is a factor,” he said. “I think it kind of tends to pump some of that (melting) water into the joints. That contributes to the damage.

“You don't see the pothole damage on the lesser-traveled residential streets that you see on the majors.”

McIntyre said he knows the potholes are in residential areas, too, but crews won't be filling them soon.

“For the most part,” he said, “95 percent of our effort is going to be on the main streets. With the higher (traffic) volumes and the higher speeds, safety is more of a concern there.”

City officials announced Friday that the Public Works Department will begin resurfacing projects across the city in mid-May, using $3 million in federal stimulus funds.

“This is gonna help a lot,” McIntyre said. “We've got subsequent packages that we're still working on with the State Department of Roads to get approved and get funding on. You could easily come up with five times that.”

Crews already are laying down asphalt overlays in areas where pothole patches aren't holding — mini resurfacing projects, if you will. “You grind out bad pavement … square off a 6-by-6 or 4-by-10 area and put down one continuous patch,” McIntyre said.

“Whenever you prep it like that, the asphalt adheres better.”

Meanwhile, folks like Frost stay busy, repairing dented or dinged-up wheels for about half or less than the cost of a new one.

Frost said he's happy to be busy, but he has to maneuver around the potholes like everybody else. “Obviously,” he said, “I would like to have them filled.”

Contact the writer:

444-1109, bob.glissmann@owh.com

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