The Point

Saturday, December 22, 2007

While you're at it

A free idea today, to whoever'll take it and run with it (or maybe you've already gotten started on it). Every year up here in the sort of (but not permanently) frozen north, we complain until our faces turn blue about potholes. It's an absurd way to talk about city budget priorities, but it's true; frost heaves pull apart the road every single year, and every single year we spend an awful lot of money fixing them so nobody falls in, plunges over a cliff, trips, etc.

But if we were to look at the design requirements for a road, what would they be? A level surface. Something that grips. Easily lay-downable. Nothing in there about needing to use an impenetrable material that irreparably cracks and splits every time the ground freezes. Maybe irate writers to editorials all across this country are onto something. Why not look for other types of materials - surfaces that don't flood all the rainwater running over them into stormdrains, surfaces that don't break apart with the ice. There's a place for this beside the people working on crosswalks that light up along the ground when you've got the right of way.

Who's working on this?

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posted by Christopher at 11:30 p.m.

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