Pot Holes

AugustusMaximus

Its great to see that our ever increasingly poor regional road networks seems to be falling apart with a week of rain. (What do countries with monsoon seasons do ?)

Anyways, whats the story about pot holes and claiming for damage to a car.

Am I correct that you can claim off of the county council if

1. The pot hole has been repaired badly.
2. The pot hole has not been repaired for a long time even after being told of the problem ?


Also, is there a reason why certain counties seem to have a larger problem with pot holes. Prob an urban myth but I've heard that roads in Cork didn't have a very good base when originally built and are more prone to pot holes ? Certainly I can think of a few roads in Cork which quite literally fall apart every 5 years.

mickdw

You are pretty much correct about claiming.
The council are not liable if a road potholes due to normal wear and tear etc. They are liable for poor repairs, any damage caused on roadworks etc and as you said, if they are told about a dangerous hole on the road and dont act to repair it in reasonable time.

bikki

The quaility of roads in this country is truely shocking. They really are bloody awful.

They have still have a patch it with a bit of Tar mentality about fixing the roads. Even the roads around Dublin City center and surrounding areas are in ****.

You would think with the increase in road tax they would spend it on actually maintaining the bloody things.

pburns

Guys wake up and smell the coffee, this is gonna get WORSE... People I know in 2 local CCs have told me councils are under SERIOUS pressure to tighten the belt (whereas I know people in public sector/quangos who have seen zero impact on spending or even :eek:recruitement freezes:eek:).

Of course the recent weather has been particularly hard on roads (apart from rain it's been much colder than recent years - global warming my arse!) but I'm not sure the €€€€s will be spent on repairing them.

And if you kids think the roads are bad now you weren't around during the '80s!

whiterebel

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

Also, is there a reason why certain counties seem to have a larger problem with pot holes. Prob an urban myth but I've heard that roads in Cork didn't have a very good base when originally built and are more prone to pot holes ? Certainly I can think of a few roads in Cork which quite literally fall apart every 5 years.

My brother in law, an engineer no less, told me that Cork City is basically built on very boggy land, and it is therefore impossible to build roads to last. He had no answer when I mentioned Amsterdam though...........

DarkJager

I drove from Limerick to Kilkenny and back again yesterday. It was possibly the most disgraceful road I have ever seen in my life. I literally could not drive 2 meters down the road without encountering a deep pothole or flood of water.

max 73

i agree, our road network & maintenance is horrendous.......actually there is a method for repairing potholes correctly but its not adhered to, it can be successfull!!!!

the main prob as i see it, in cork anyway, is when a road is opened up ( alicence needs to be obtained first at a cost...) the necessary works are carried out but the backfilling and subsequent road surface reinstatement takes place its of poor qualtity ie done on the cheap!!! there is time needed before the final re-surfacing takes place to allow the backfill material to settle - but the councils (city & co.) dont go after the contractor responsible, in my view anyway.

for what my opinion is worth, when road opening is carried out, the contractor should have to reinstate 5 metres either side of the opening that way it distributes any variances that could occur - and if its not carried out, he doesnt get his deposit back!

just my opinion

x in the city

Thats what happens for voting FF and having a screwed up government for over a decade.


Roads in Ireland are a disgrace, for a developed country its lol

The only roads in Ireland that have no pot holes are our motorways, all 20km of them.....:rolleyes:

L1011

x in the city wrote: »

The only roads in Ireland that have no pot holes are our motorways, all 20km of them.....:rolleyes:

Think you missed a 0 there... and a multiplier

We have about 450km of motorway open.

Alun

whiterebel wrote: »

My brother in law, an engineer no less, told me that Cork City is basically built on very boggy land, and it is therefore impossible to build roads to last. He had no answer when I mentioned Amsterdam though...........

Amsterdam, and most of the Netherlands isn't "boggy" though in the sense that much of Ireland is. It may be wet, but much of the ground is sand which compacts down well and forms a fairly decent stable base for roads. In fact if you watch them when they're building complex motorway junctions in the Netherlands, a lot of the on and off ramps are built on what are essentially huge piles of sand. Also don't forget that large swathes of the Netherlands are only kept from being underwater by a large complex network of pumps running 24/7.

Svalbard

Roads in New Zealand seem uniformly well surfaced. On a recent trip there it was nigh impossible to go on a road journey of any duration without encountering at least one road works. Not the massive digging-up-half-the-road-for-2-miles-to-lay-some-pipes variety, but what seemed to be routine maintenance and basic resurfacing.
If it the sheep-shaggers can do it, why can't we?

Yakult

Try the roads in kerry, 2 flat tyres in one week. €170

TestTransmission

R_H_C_P wrote: »

Try the roads in kerry, 2 flat tyres in one week. €170

Sounds like your tyres arent inflated to the correct pressure or possibly you're driving too hard

Capt'n Midnight

part of the problem is political, in the sense that many people believe that road works are just there for elections. the worst thing that could happen is that the roads are fixed properly so the local politician can't be seen to be keeping their promise to fix them :rolleyes:

http://reports.eea.europa.eu/ENVISSUENo12/en/page020.html -look at the table
Data
The length of infrastructure per inhabitant (1996)
Unit: km/million inhabitants
we have far more Municipal roads per capita than anyone else

so many that maybe we should ban large trucks on older roads because ONE truck does as much damage as a TEN THOUSAND* cars on them.

*http://saferoads.org/dangers-large-trucks - says 9,600 but US cars are bigger so call 10K

Capt'n Midnight

bikki wrote: »

You would think with the increase in road tax they would spend it on actually maintaining the bloody things.

if road tax was used to pay for roads then it would be based on the axle loading / speed of the vehicle , or some other way to equate the increased cost of the damage done by heavier vehicles to that done by lighter vehicles

If we want to reduce the damage, just remove the heavier stuff first, it's not rocket science

http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/news/local/article/LOAD22_20081221-213506/159596/

Heavy loads did $211.4 million in damage to the state's roads in 2007, according to Allen, who heads the Virginia Transportation Research Council at the University of Virginia.

That's about 19 percent of the state's annual highway maintenance bill.

But trucks paid only $2.7 million in fees for perm
...
Because of the repetitive pounding it gives roadways, a heavily loaded tractor-trailer produces 8,000 to 9,000 times as much damage to highways and bridges as a passenger car, Allen said.
...
Based on sound engineering principles, Allen said, VDOT estimates that a tractor-trailer weighing 116,000 pounds traveling the 325 miles of Interstate 81 in Virginia and crossing its 58 bridges should pay $142.67 for the single trip.

In another example, Allen said a 100,000 pound tractor-trailer driving 50,000 miles in a year should pay $2,403 for an annual "blanket" permit.

oh yeah that's a US car, Irish cars are lighter

Sam Kade

whiterebel wrote: »

My brother in law, an engineer no less, told me that Cork City is basically built on very boggy land, and it is therefore impossible to build roads to last. He had no answer when I mentioned Amsterdam though...........

So all the land in Cork where roads are built is boggy. Where did he learn his engineering skills? :rolleyes:

Did anyone hear that in 07 the Irish government were to give NI €580m to fund their major roads?

mickdw

It news to me that a road cannot be built in a boggy location. It can but it costs to do it properly and there is the problem.

positron

The Dublin Road in Drogheda (Drogheda to M1) is probably one of the worst roads I have driven in this country - cars have started driving a bit on to the opposite late (I do it too, when safely possible, especially in front of Black Bull Inn) to avoid the worst..!

McSpud

max 73 wrote: »

the main prob as i see it, in cork anyway, is when a road is opened up ( alicence needs to be obtained first at a cost...) the necessary works are carried out but the backfilling and subsequent road surface reinstatement takes place its of poor qualtity ie done on the cheap!!! there is time needed before the final re-surfacing takes place to allow the backfill material to settle - but the councils (city & co.) dont go after the contractor responsible, in my view anyway.

Not particular to Cork but I heard that contractors had to put up some sort of bond before they dig up roads. If the road is not adequately repaired the CC can keep the bond to do it themselves. Clearly the CC do not use that cash for road repairs.

IMO the worst road in the country is the Rochestown road in Cork. It must have been resurfaced 3 times in the last 10 years but after a year or two the top surface literally peels off. Clearly someone is not doing the job paid to do.

Boggy land is a pathetic excuse, rain is even worse. There are loads of countries which get covered in snow which means ploughs need to clear the roads.

towel401

who ever taught these guys how to make roads should be given a kick. any chance they could get someone in from Holland to show them how it's done?

_Kaiser_

Meath Co Co are leaving themselves wide open as the N3 through Kells is always being patched up every few months. Right now it's full of pot holes again at the top end of the town (at the junction with SuperValu for anyone who knows it), and driving through this stretch is like an obsticle course.

Most of the other roads in the county aren't great either

Berty

I will try to help you with why the roads are failing their structural integrity.

New roads are built with sub base's and even more recently with a concrete material called CBM.

Older roads/regional roads are built with layers of incorrect sized aggregate to fill in the cracks and holes.

Bord Gas, Eircom and many other tools come along and dig big holes in them and then fill in the holes with the wrong materials.

We wear this down over time and because there is no sub-base and the incorect filling/levelling we just tear this to shreds.

Water when it falls on the incorrect type of asphalt and wearing course just sits there and seeps into the core instead of sinking through the core and into the sub base. It creates air pockets and the weight of our cars/trucks pop the air pocket causing the structure to fail and create a pot hole.

= bye bye tyres.

Coucils will then use a clause called non malfeasance to cover themselves against compensating you for the damage. It basically says they cannot be everywhere all the time.

mumhaabu

I have read this thread and potholes are a bane of my life and recently I find myself watching the road more often for potholes and this is distracting to my driving!

What is wrong in Ireland is our entire system of roads are wrong. We all pay the 5 crippling taxes, VRT, VAT <(on fuel, cars, servicing etc.) Fuel Duty, Insurance Duty, and Road Tolls.

All thing money goes into the various agencies, VRT and VAT and Fuel Dutyto the Revenue commissioners and this money is used to run the country and bailout the odd member of ex Galway races tent.

Anyway only the National Routes are maintained by the NRA and they do a goodish enough job of it and it is usually done by contractors on bonds who do good jobs and know what they are doing.

The rest of the roads are maintained by the various county councils, these councils employ the local idiots in every town and parish whose fathers or mothers are direct members of Fianna Fail. They do all the road maintenance and do a perfectly bad job every time. As a matter of fact if you tendered for disposable roads Internationally Ireland's council workers would come up trumps every time.

Irish non-national roads are entirely tar and chips the most useless road surface known to mankind, I cringed at the WRC calling it Irelands "tarmac" which it most certainly is not.

Every single road should be built with one metre of concrete as its base and one foot of proper tarmac on top. These roads will last forever and bogs are not an excuse, cutting costs and siphoning off money however are.

Yet another reason to add the 200,000 other reasons to dump out Fianna fail for good.

Jemmy

Svalbard wrote: »

Not the massive digging-up-half-the-road-for-2-miles-to-lay-some-pipes variety

This is work that has to be done to improve services. Alot of mains lines are being improved because they are they hundreds of years.
Guys you all need to get over it, nothing is going to change. As was said serious cutback are being made people are being let go and everything.


The road I live on has to be the worst road in the country it's like a back lane with about 3 potholes for every square metre, no joke. We've been onto the council for 10 yrs now to get the road done and no joy, and it's not like I'm living in the back of beyond it's a busy road and it's only about 2km long it's not a big job.

mcwhirter

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

Its great to see that our ever increasingly poor regional road networks seems to be falling apart with a week of rain. (What do countries with monsoon seasons do ?)

Anyways, whats the story about pot holes and claiming for damage to a car.

Am I correct that you can claim off of the county council if

1. The pot hole has been repaired badly.
2. The pot hole has not been repaired for a long time even after being told of the problem ?


Also, is there a reason why certain counties seem to have a larger problem with pot holes. Prob an urban myth but I've heard that roads in Cork didn't have a very good base when originally built and are more prone to pot holes ? Certainly I can think of a few roads in Cork which quite literally fall apart every 5 years.

Meath is no better, whenever there is frost or heavy rain, the potholes appear and then are filled in by council truck. This lasts a few months then they appear again.
Why not just make the roads correctly instead of repairing the bad application of tarmac.

Berty

I had to nearly restrain myself ( would have been funny to watch ) from getting out of my car and smacking some county council workers up and down the street. On the Finnegans roundabout in Limerick which is not finished ( new M7 ) the final layer of blacktop has not been laid for obvious reasons. These numpties are the weekend were standing there with a shovel each taking the wrong type of asphalt and aggregate from the back of the truck, placing it around a manhole and then standing on it to flatten it out.

First off idiots now you cannot open the manhole and secondly the main contractor will now have to come along and remove your god damn blacktop because its going to create a bow in the blacktop. Its not as though there was such a serious requirment for these idiots to spread this asphalt.

Justification for their existence.

S.I.R

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

Its great to see that our ever increasingly poor regional road networks seems to be falling apart with a week of rain. (What do countries with monsoon seasons do ?)

Anyways, whats the story about pot holes and claiming for damage to a car.

Am I correct that you can claim off of the county council if

1. The pot hole has been repaired badly.
2. The pot hole has not been repaired for a long time even after being told of the problem ?


Also, is there a reason why certain counties seem to have a larger problem with pot holes. Prob an urban myth but I've heard that roads in Cork didn't have a very good base when originally built and are more prone to pot holes ? Certainly I can think of a few roads in Cork which quite literally fall apart every 5 years.

take a picture of the road in question, the pothole and ofcourse the damage sustained...

is she still driving ?

qoute from the garage for repairs and such, as i wreaked a full front right side of mine afetr a silly pothole near my house...

Anything to keep me off the road... :mad:

you could fit mary harney in it for crying out loud... a complete and utter sham... and im in the commuter route, in the capital of all places.. but it honestly doesnt seem like it !

craichoe

bikki wrote: »

The quaility of roads in this country is truely shocking. They really are bloody awful.

They have still have a patch it with a bit of Tar mentality about fixing the roads. Even the roads around Dublin City center and surrounding areas are in ****.

You would think with the increase in road tax they would spend it on actually maintaining the bloody things.

The quality of the Roads in Belgium and alot of Western Germany are far worse ! The inadequate drainage on the Belgian motorways is especially bad, going across the border in the netherlands its like its stopped raining !!

positron

I am going to get one of these tax disk holders: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Tax-Disc---YES-I-HAVE-PAID-MY-TAX-NOW-GO-FIX........_W0QQitemZ150319653271QQcmdZViewItemQQimsxZ20090107?IMSfp=TL0901071310003r17097

Run_to_da_hills

Potholes are back, a few years ago Murphys had the contracts for repairing roads, they did an excellent job, sometimes the repair would go unnoticed. Now I see many of these repairs handed out to cowboys who do a quick patch up job. I would notice this more than most drivers because I ride a motorbike.

itarumaa

whiterebel wrote: »

My brother in law, an engineer no less, told me that Cork City is basically built on very boggy land, and it is therefore impossible to build roads to last. He had no answer when I mentioned Amsterdam though...........

You could ask your brother in law how they can make roads in Lapland.

Every winter the earth freezes almost 1 meter below the surface and every spring it melts again. Trucks weight 60 tons and in real life even more. Most of the cars use studded tyres that eat away the tarmac guite well. And still roads are better than here:)

Svalbard

Jemmy wrote: »

This is work that has to be done to improve services. Alot of mains lines are being improved because they are they hundreds of years.

Obviously. You misinterpreted what I said.

Jemmy

Berty wrote: »

I had to nearly restrain myself ( would have been funny to watch ) from getting out of my car and smacking some county council workers up and down the street. On the Finnegans roundabout in Limerick which is not finished ( new M7 ) the final layer of blacktop has not been laid for obvious reasons.

Thats the NRA not council.

lisa_celtic

I was driven round the square in Thurles one day behind a council van.. all of a sudden it stops pops on the hazzards three of em jump out get shovels throw a bit of gravel on it and hop back in the van.. and drive off.. the hole was back two days later..

Berty

Jemmy wrote: »

Thats the NRA not council.

It was the local council and just to elighten you some more the NRA do not build roads, they tender the jobs out to companies to build them.

In this case it is a CJV project and the poxy council workers were messing up the contractors work on the tie in justifying their existence to the council.

I worked for the company who built the original section of the road(southern bypass) and no we didnt work for the NRA.

NewApproach

Gort. End of.

D_murph

I was very lucky to get away with a balancing job on this one over the weekend here...

The pot hole was nearly full of water and I was in it before I knew any better :mad:

BTW, thanks to eringobragh for the advice on the car camera system .

Jemmy

Berty wrote: »

It was the local council and just to elighten you some more the NRA do not build roads, they tender the jobs out to companies to build them.

I know all about the tendering procedure, my point was they aren't council workers, because just to enlighten you the council don't maintain NRA roads!

Yakult

jackncoke wrote: »

Sounds like your tyres arent inflated to the correct pressure or possibly you're driving too hard

Correct trye pressure as i check em twice a week. They are 17's tho so that doesnt make the job any easier