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Comment by idiotsecant | Hacker News Reader

nobody leaves a dent in the surface on purpose, the problem is that whatever caused the pothole is almost certainly still causing it to sink under the surface. A patch doesn't fix the problem, it just makes it less bad.

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Yep. Step 0 in the above list is "build a road with insufficient subsurface/foundation preparation and drainage"

There's a section of town that was developed on an old swampy bit of land. They drained the swamp but did not let the land dry/settle long enough after draining the water. This caused parts of the road to sink, but not enough to break/crack the roads. Instead, they just have swells as you're driving along. It's actually impressive on how much sinking happened without breaking the road itself.

The local obscenely named utility company dug in our road a few years ago, necessitating a large patch. They proceeded to drive through their patch as they left. The tire dents & ridges are still there years later. You're right, of course, but I think you may be overestimating the concern patch crews give to their craft.

That's a method in the manual - "roll-and-go". The fact that it's still there years later is actually proof that the patch was effective, if maybe not well applied.

That's ... How you compact a patch.

Anyhow, it doesn't matter how much care they put into the job, if the substrate fails the road fails. Simple as that. Patches are temporary fixes.

Eh, maybe I didn't describe it well. We're talking 1 lane wide, maybe 80 ft long. Dually tire path through the patch. Indented, with the displaced material ridged up along the side, diagonal across the lane. It yanks my motorcycle tire sideways if I hit it, and it's a decent bump in a car. If that's… how you compact it, we need new standards.

Less bad is ok.

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