Let’s Paint Our Potholes

Let’s face it, they’re not going to be fixed in the short term, so how about giving them a quick shot of flourescent paint to at least let people know where they are? Better they swerve a few feet further back than at the last minute in a panic, or hit the damned thing and lose control. Might save a few expensive suspension repairs into the bargain.

(This article is actually about an idea by a couple of Italian design students to add colour to the tar, so that potholes are automatically highlighted when they appear, but the principle is the same.)

NYTimes.com: April is the cruelest month, wrote T.S. Eliot, possibly considering his tires and suspension, but March is pretty close. This time of year also brings new ideas for dealing with potholes.

One idea to help is to make potholes easier to avoid, even if they can’t be prevented or fixed. Several students in Italy have come up with a novel design idea.

Domenico Diego and Cristina Corradini of the Milan Polytechnic university call their plan the “Street Safe Initiative.” Their idea is to brightly color a lower layer of asphalt so that a break in the surface becomes easy to spot and the potholes easier to dodge.