With the warmer weather recently in the city, crews have turned their attention to potholes and flooding. Transportation and City Parks Manager Robert Caroll says city crews are hitting both of those tasks full force for this past week and that will continue.
Carroll says pothole crews will focus on smaller patch jobs, while later in the spring asphalt plants will be the focus.
“While we’re still in relatively cold weather, we use what’s called a cold patch. It’s basically asphalt that we store and stockpile. We load it in our trucks, bring it in, warm it up overnight inside and use that to fill potholes. It’s not a permanent fix but it takes the danger out of the roads,” he says.
Even though snow removal season is soon to be in the rearview mirror, Carroll says he and other city officials have taken some lessons away from the last six months.
“It was a tough winter and the pandemic certainly didn’t help. We had to abide by the provincial regulations and we also had issues with people showing up due to COVID-19, which we haven’t had in the past. We were running short-staffed during a lot of those shifts as well. We are lucky to have a group of contractors that we can call upon when we need some extra help,” he says.
Priority 1 and priority 2 routes will be the first to see repairs, keeping the same schedule as snow removal, according to Carroll.