Get off my tail, there's a pothole!

Engineers pave way toward better roads

February 28, 1996
Web posted at: 6:45 p.m. EST

From Correspondent Al Hinman

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- For those who live in cities where potholes dot the streets like craters dot the moon, hope may be on the way.

Civil engineers at Philadelphia's Drexel University are researching ways to build the roads of tomorrow better.

New composite materials of carbon and high-tech fibers could replace steel reinforcement rods in roads and bridges, eliminating much of road deterioration caused by rusting steel.

Instead of today's asphalt or concrete surfaces, future highways could be coated with durable new water-resistant coatings, making potholes a thing of the past. Some of today's better-built bridges already practice these solutions by putting tension on paving sections, which keeps water out.

"It's an engineering solution, not a scientific solution," says Joseph Martin at Drexel University.

However, the fight to improve potholes is nothing new. Our colonial forefathers were constantly patching roads. In fact, it's believed the first potholes date back to Roman times, when potters dug up hunks from the clay roads -- hence the name.

Many of today's potholes are caused by water that seeps through the pavement, then expands as it freezes, breaking up the road, explains engineer Daniel Clark.

Drexel's Martin is convinced engineers already have the basic technology needed to build tomorrow's better roads.

However, Martin estimates the improved roads cost about 20 percent more to build, which is a lot of money in the increasingly tight budgets of most highway planners.

But until that future date when motorists are willing to pay more for fewer potholes, or some engineer comes up with a low-cost, pothole-free road, street crews will keep on patching -- and motorists will keep on grumbling.