Deadline nears, pothole grows

Deadline nears, pothole grows
Civic Officials Throw Norms To Wind, Do Shoddy And Rush Job
The Times of India

Bangalore: Blink and miss. That’s the time they’re taking to fill up those life-endangering potholes.

If a hitherto battered pothole heavy road resembles a muchpatched blanket, it’s all thanks to the shoddy work being done by civic authorities. Find a crater, just pour some slurry or quarry dust and flake off to administer the same treatment to another one. That has been the modus operandi of giving people smooth roads, in a rush to meet deadlines.

Ten days ago, people in residential areas like Malleswaram, R T Nagar, Rajajinagar, Amarjyotinagar rejoiced when BMP workers landed and furiously dug deep into the already existing potholes. The workers returned at eight in the night and filled up the craters in a jiffy.

Even at arterial roads like Church Street, Race Course Road, parts of Koramangala, Kamaraj Road, Palace Guttahalli, there are potholes within a pothole!

90 km of arterial roads have been classified as ‘deteriorated’ with a PCI (pavement condition index) of less than 50 per cent.

Just what is the precise method of treating a pothole, according to standard norms? Explains a BMP engineer: “Workers are supposed to cut a square or rectangle at the site of a pothole. For a medium or large pothole they are supposed to use jackhammers, for very small ones they can do it manually. The crater is then filled with well graded premixed emulsion or hot mix. The roller is then run on it to flatten it and have it on the surface level.’’
So then why do filled-up potholes reappear with unfailing regularity? Engineers and workers attribute it to the sub-standard quality of hot mix that is sometimes bought.

A month ago when President A P J Abdul Kalam visited the city, the stretches of road he was travelling along got that much-needed facelift. Of significance is the 3-km road from Wind Tunnel leading to NAL, which was well-asphalted overnight!

For three years people traversing the stretch have been fighting tooth and nail to get a decent road, among other things.

Here’s the caveat that was not known — officials acknowledge that the road belongs to NAL and not the BMP. “By no standards can this done-up road be called even decent. We had to do it in record time for the official visit. It will be completely re-laid later,’’ they admit.