Winter has stomped great holes into the streets of the Indianapolis metropolitan area, and though the city is trying to patch the pots, the weather has not cooperated. Snow, cold, warmth and freezing have wreaked havoc on the asphalt jungle. Contraction, expansion, cracking and collapse and pothole madness is upon us.
I grew up in Pittsburgh Penn., where the streets are narrow and winding and some are still paved with the original cobbles. On many streets, the later veneer of asphalt has been worn so thin that the cobbles can be felt in each jolting passage. The jackboot of winter breaks through the surface of those streets, but the citizens are savvy, and the steel ballet of speeding cars in a simultaneous swerve to avoid a pothole is a signature moment in brutal winters. I’ve not lived there since 1970, and not spent a lot of driving time on tundra-like streets, so my survival skills are rusty. Which might explain my bottoming out in a crater on S. Emerson Street.
People who live in regions of weather extremes manage to find acceptance in the possibility of inconvenience. Living in a snow belt increases the chance that you will encounter snow. I spent years in the San Joaquin valley of central California, where I could happily anticipate sunshine. And swimming in my in-ground pool in March.
But this winter in Indy has been a trial, and many of the streets have failed the test. On a recent, nasty day, I traveled East Washington Street from Sherman to Shadeland; all of the cars were concentrated in the left-hand lane. The occasional impatient driver would dart into the right-hand lane and pound in and out of the holes that had developed near the curbs. On that day, the snow was still piled high near the curb, and wary pedestrians were making their way across the crest of ice. I worried that someone would slip and slide away into traffic.
We expect our municipal taxes to pay for a proper paving of paradise, but potholes are an unfortunate winter byproduct of those paved and graded streets. The Indiana Department of Transportation’s pothole-patcher people have been busy on the highways and streets, tarring and tamping, but they cannot plug the holes faster than Big Momma Nature can open them. So, what is one to do? I don’t remember a program in Pittsburgh where one could call to report a pothole; potholes are ubiquitous, so I imagine that a reporting system — if anyone in Pittsburgh ever took it seriously — would be blown up in hours by the crush of calls.
The day I slammed the bottom of my car against the Indianapolis pavement was a reminder to me that I must be vigilant, especially when driving in the right-hand lane of any city street. (I can cite no scientific evidence as to why potholes like to congregate next to curbs, but it seems that way to me.) It also shook me into an understanding about the source of the proliferation of tin on the streets. The whang of a wheel into a pothole sets free the hubcap, which spins gaily down the street, free at last, free at last. (Of course, the description of “tin” may apply only to beaters; modern cars have hubcaps and wheel covers made of plastic.)
Wintertime has gripped the city with an icy glove, ripped open its streets, torn down trees, gutters and power lines and strung icicles from my birdfeeder. Ok: that last may have been for the birds, and a bit too much. It must be because I have pothole madness.