Not To Worry, We Are In Good Hands! Really Good Hands!

Last week, about one week after National Grid's contractor finished up their street and sidewalk asphalt patching work on Warren Street, I came across a wide and deep hole in the sidewalk of the 400 block next to a National Grid gas valve.  Today, the hole was still waiting to put someone on their chin and destroy an ankle, so I grabbed a cone perched on a fire hydrant across the street and placed it over the hole.

It's pretty obvious that Robert Perry, our $115,000 DPW Superintendent, never bothered to inspect the sidewalks or driving surface of Warren Street (or South 3rd Street) after National Grid's contractor packed up and headed home to Saugerties.  It's probably too cold for him to do that, especially if he's wearing his Crocs and pink golf pants!  How about the mayor?  Do you think Kamal cares what the sidewalks look like or how unsafe they are?  Not for just $75,000 a year he doesn't care!  Gotta pay him as much or more than the DPW Superintendent for him to even consider whether or not he should care!

If you are bored and know you should take a walk (and really want to be cheered up), make your way to the 200 block of State Street to see what National Grid's paving contractor left for us in the street there.  (If it's not your block, keep in mind that it could have been!)  It appears that our DPW Superintendent deems that work to be just as acceptable as what was left behind on the sidewalks of Warren Street by a different contractor, where cones, holes, divots, loose asphalt and lumps of black asphalt will be the norm for at least the next 4 or 5 months. 

On the Warren Street sidewalks (3rd Street to 6th) we have black asphalt where concrete should be. In the street is asphalt, as it should be. This work is courtesy of Mullen & Sons.

In the 200 block of State Street, for the entire block, there is rough concrete in the street where asphalt should be, and it's nothing short of shit work.  Somehow last week, though, the holes in the sidewalks were actually topped with smooth concrete!  This work is courtesy of Bob Talham, Inc. of Troy.

Footprints in the crosswalk!

N. 3rd Street above State, part of Talham's
 work in the 200 block of State Street

Notice to the sides of the new and smooth
portion of sidewalk, where forms were 
removed and dirt not filled in!  Real pro-
fessional like! (1st at State, across from Bliss)

Piece of an orange cone stuck in new 
concrete in the street, left behind by
a professional paving contractor
hired by National Grid to work in
the city's most challenged neighborhood.

Who on earth, if anyone, is steering this ship we call Hudson?