City Hall’s chief administrative officer returned to a ragged road. Make that a once-ragged road.
When we last bumped into Rob Smuts on York Street between Chapel and Crown, he was acknowledging that too many city roads had become crater-filled obstacle courses. York Street was Exhibit A. Smuts promised that once the new city budget took effect he would get the city departments he oversees moving on filling potholes — and to doing so in a smarter way than in the past.
The budget took effect July 1. Now Smuts was pleased to be able to stand on the same road and watch vehicles pass by without a bump. That road — and other main stretches like Goffe Street and Sherman Avenue — have smooth new asphalt carpets.
Smuts reported that after just two months the city has completed about two-thirds of the repaving work for which it has money this year. That covers between four and five of the city’s 220 miles of road. Click on the play arrow at the top of the story to watch Smuts dodge passing cars — as well as a Segway-riding leafletter from TD Banknorth — to deliver his update. (The Segway-rider makes her cameo appearance 38 seconds into the video.)
Smuts said the public works department has been in touch with the gas and electric companies to stay on top of contractors who patch up roads after cutting them to work on utility lines. Poor patch jobs, and poor timing in doing the utility jobs (in relationship to the city’s calendar for repaving streets), have in the past wrecked roads before their time.
Smuts urged readers to report streets that remain in bad shape, to SeeClickFix. And click on the play arrow to watch Smuts’ original promises on the subject in a July interview.
Past Episodes of “Rob Smuts Explains”:
Rob Smuts Explains Haste On Trash Plan
Rob Smuts Explains The Pothole Menace
Rob Smuts Explains Cop Overtime
Rob Smuts Explains Your Garbage
Rob Smuts Explains The Search
is the City of New Haven abandoning it's Web 311 program? Potholes are indeed being filled in, but it's still up to the citizen to report problems so work orders can be produced!
I'd like to see the City improve the Park St and Crown St intersection, where there are WEEKLY car crashes caused by people running the red, illegal left-turn-on-red cars from Crown to Park, and no visibility- cars are parked all the way to the corner on Park and Crown Streets.
Any plans to fix Whitney Ave? Dwight St sinkholes? Crumbling sidewalks on George between Howe and Park?