City of San Angelo Grapples with Post-Rain Pothole Crisis

SAN ANGELO, TX —The public can assist the City’s effort to fill potholes by reporting them in one of three ways: at cosatx.us/potholes, by emailing [email protected] or by calling 324-657-4231. Citizens are asked to provide the nearest address or intersection to the pothole.

All available City of San Angelo Street & Bridge employees are working from 7 a.m. until dark seven days a week filling potholes caused by abnormally high rainfall the past two months. The crews are being supplemented with peers from other City operations; those workers are joining the effort after-hours once they have completed their normal duties. The Street & Bridge division currently has about 20 workers assigned to repairing potholes.

“We realize the pothole situation is serious,” Operations Director Shane Kelton said. “We are devoting every possible resource to filling as many potholes as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, our manpower has been overwhelmed by the number of potholes, which have worsened after all the rain we’ve recently received.”

Kelton said roadway expansion and contraction caused by the weather, coupled with traffic patterns and the poor condition of some roadways, have exacerbated the number and severity of potholes.

As a stopgap measure, workers are temporarily filling potholes with a loose mix and tamping down the materials. Once the number of potholes has been reduced to a manageable number and the ground has sufficiently dried, crews will return to cut out and replace the potholed portions of streets. Those more thorough measures should provide a sturdier driving surface, Kelton said.