Pothole persecution
It’s the most glorious time of the year. The snow and ice are melting but before the mosquitos wake up, it’s pothole season. With that in mind, here’s a tongue-in-cheek opinion piece that first appeared in the March 20, 2009 edition of The Citizen on the topic: A group of 100 scientists from around the world is holding a conference in Prince George next month to discuss potholes.
“We’re hoping the forum can help educate the public about the value of potholes in road ecosystems,” said Dr. Freddy Bumpindarode, the director of orcacavus studies (the scientific word for pothole is orcacavus from Latin) in the urban planning department at UNBC.
Some of the workshops open to the public include an introduction to the various breeds of potholes, orcacavi reproductive habits and the socio-economic benefits of potholes in the Canadian polity. A debate is also planned on whether potholes evolved from dinosaur footprints or whether they are just punishment from a divine Creator.
Bumpindarode realizes there is a huge public backlash against potholes.
“That’s why we picked Prince George to host our conference,” he explained. “The city is blessed with an amazing diversity of potholes worthy of continued study and residents should appreciate what they have.”
The professor makes a compelling case. The current negative view of potholes across North America, he argues, is comparable to how wolves were shot by early settlers for being a nuisance and a threat to cattle.
Filling in every pothole in a community like Prince George would make local roads worse, not better, because smooth roads, free of obstacles, have a higher accident rate than streets littered with potholes.
That’s one of the findings of a major new study published in the prestigious Journal of Orcacavus Studies.
In a five-year study of more than 10,000 drivers in 22 cities, ranging in size from Prince George to Los Angeles, both the number of accidents and the severity of the accidents in terms of injury and death declined on streets with more potholes.
Tiny cameras mounted on the rearview mirror showed how drivers paid closer attention and drove more carefully on streets when they had to dodge holes in the road.
“Potholes serve a clear and useful purpose in street ecology,” says Prof. Pete Fulluvit, one of the main authors of the groundbreaking study and a professor of sociology at York University in Toronto.
The report recommends cities demand subdivision developers to build potholes into the streets of new neighbourhoods, forcing drivers to slow down and watch for seniors and children in residential areas.
Bumpindarode contributed data from Prince George to the study and agreed that city council needs to take a more modern view of the longmisunderstood pothole.
“Filling in potholes on four-lane streets like Fifth, Foothills, Ospika, Tabor and Domano just turn these roads into accidentprone raceways over the summer,” he said. “Our study, combined with statistics from ICBC, show potholes are not the road hazard we have always believed they are.”
One of the academics attending the conference is already in Prince George, cataloguing the range of pothole breeds. Prof. John Nutbar, a top orcacavus expert and pioneer in the fledgling field, from the University of Wisconsin can be found most days dodging traffic while measuring the size and depth of potholes on city boulevards.
“What you have here in Prince George is amazing,” Nutbar gasped breathlessly, safe on the sidewalk on Massey Drive in front of Masich Place Stadium, having been nearly run down by a late-model Ford pickup.
Massey Drive between Carney Street and Pine Centre Mall has five breeds of pothole species co-existing together: the common crevice, the spotted whole-lane crater, the spring road chasm, the deadly road rupture and the double-humped trench.
Nutbar has also observed in Prince the endangered camouflaged fissure and the grey-striped dugout, along with the only confirmed sighting of a muddy water hollow made in the last five years anywhere in the world outside of Syria.
“Unfortunately, society just wants to fill in all of these beautiful creatures,” Nutbar sighed, preparing to dash out to measure an infant road rupture during a short break in traffic. “I just dream of a time when people will stop persecuting them and appreciate them for how special and unique they are.”
— Editor-in-chief Neil Godbout
Filling in every pothole in a community like Prince George would make local roads worse, not better, because smooth roads, free of obstacles, have a higher accident rate than streets littered with potholes.