The Town of Olds' operations department is treating numerous potholes around the community with gravel and waiting until the frost is gone to do a better job on patching the problems.
“There's numerous locations around the community where we've had, as a result of late-in-the-year excavations last fall or new water leaks or new utility services … that we need to maintain a watch for,” said Larry Wright, the town's director of operations.
Some of the more prominent potholes around town include one on 49 Avenue near Highway 27, another at 52 Avenue and Highway 27 and some on 65 Avenue.
In some cases, Wright said the holes will be temporarily filled with gravel or cold oil-based gravel until the weather warms up.
“It's very hard to get those patches to hold right now. We have, over the past three weeks, had to try to patch areas with the freezing at night and the daytime highs,” he said.
“There's definitely some wet areas and some settlements occurring where the utility companies have been working and we'll just try to keep working with those. We don't want to see damage to the shallow utility systems.”
The town is currently putting out tenders for a number of different areas throughout the community for major road repairs, which could include laying down new asphalt, Wright said. Parts of 50 Avenue, 48 Street, 53 Avenue and 65 Avenue are all due for major repairs.
Some of the more common problems for vehicles that have gone through major potholes include faulty wheel alignment, premature tire wear and ruptured tires. If the vehicle doesn't steer as well as before, or there is audible vibration, people should get their vehicle looked at.
“The worst is (faulty wheel alignment) goes unnoticed and say you scrub the inside or the outside off your tires, so then (you) get premature tire wear. You've got to mitigate your speed and slow down (before the hole),” said John Lavoie, service manager at Olds' Cam Clark Ford.
If the pothole is large and deep, front-end components on a vehicle can be damaged and shock absorbers can leak. Other issues could include anti-lock brake system problems and deteriorating ball bearings inside the wheel bearings.
“That itself can cause brake issues, because the sensor isn't reading properly,” said Richard Fehr, shop foreman at Hildebrand Motors.
Fehr said in about 10 per cent of cases in which a pothole is hit, it can cause severe damage while in 25 per cent of cases where a pothole is hit, it will be severe enough to cause wheel alignment issues.
“That's kind of a ballpark (figure) from experience,” he said.
