You don’t have to go far in Waterloo Region to find someone complaining about potholes.
Along Bridge Street in Kitchener, crews have been out every day to fill holes – but will have to spend many more days doing so, because the holes keep getting worse.
“The city’s been doing the best they can, but unfortunately the water here is causing us some grief,” says Shelley Goodyear-Greb of SMP Auto Sales, which has potholes dotting the side of the road near its driveway.
But despite anecdotal evidence of lots of potholes, Waterloo’s public works commissioner says it’s been a fairly ordinary pothole season so far.
“I don’t expect this year to be worse than any other year,” Bill Garibaldi tells CTV News.
The real test, Garibaldi says, will come over the next few weeks as temperatures bounce above and below the freezing mark on a more regular basis.
By contrast, the deep freeze Waterloo experienced for most of January and February froze the roads and prevented potholes from popping up for a few weeks.
Although Kitchener roads aren’t under Garibaldi’s purview, he’s not surprised by the difficulties keeping roads repaired on Bridge Street – and says it’s the same case anywhere.
“The only problem with our repair method … is that it’s not permanent,” he says.
“We put cold mix in, (but) if there’s lots of traffic that goes over that pothole … it’ll pull that material back out.”
Waterloo budgets about $80,000 for pothole repairs each year, and Garibaldi says he doesn’t expect the city will have to exceed that.
That’s not the case with snow clearing, which has cost Waterloo $2 million this winter – on a budget of $1.5 million.
Money has been pulled from a reserve fund, but with little left in that fund, the city may look to top it up in case the next winter packs a similar punch.
