What New Idling Law? What Climate Disaster? What Budget Woes? What Public Trash Can That's Looked Like Crap For Years? DPW's Got A Road To Rebuild!

As DPW Superintendent Rob Perry promised us last week via an announcement on the city's website, excavation began yesterday on Harry Howard Avenue to fix the problem below that caused the road to fracture and be shut down to vehicle traffic two weeks ago.  There is now a rather large hole in the street, though it is not where I expected it to be. 

Because the hole that DPW dug yesterday is far from Underhill Pond's outlet pipe, it seems that I was wrong two weeks ago when I surmised that a leaky outlet pipe was the culprit that caused the roadway to fail.  My revised guess is that DPW found a break in a sewer pipe or water main near the bottom of the inclined portion of Harry Howard leading to the flat portion of the street along the pond.  If that pipe has been leaking for a long time, the loose water -- with the help of gravity and the incline -- likely washed away a whole lot of what had been supporting much of the driving surface of Harry Howard as it makes its way past the pond, especially on the side closest to the hill where the majority of the damage road can be seen.

When DPW finally removes the long section of cracked asphalt to begin the process of completely rebuilding the road down to the subbase (foundation), there will probably be lots of empty space where dirt and fill once supported the road but has been washed away. The old outlet pipe will be there, of course.  Will Rob Perry replace it while he can, whether or not it too is leaking?  

When I passed by the site yesterday afternoon, the DPW foreman's pickup truck sat with its engine idling in the middle of the closed-off portion of the street while he was standing near his freshly dug hole at least 75 feet away.  I'm thinking that Frank Rogers takes great pride in unnecessarily idling his diesel-burning truck -- possibly even for hours -- that we pay to keep its gas tank full.  Just like his boss, Rob Perry, does.   Serial idlers both, and possibly climate deniers, too.  Nobody tells them they can't waste gas and money and pollute the atmosphere and our lungs unnecessarily, so why wouldn't they?  

You also have to wonder what at least a few DPW workers (including the superintendent and his foreman) would be doing if not for this emergency that, according to Rob Perry, "weather permitting," will keep them busy for at least the next four weeks.

It appears that Rob Perry has chosen to stop maintaining 
our wooden public trash receptacles.  My guess is that this
one will soon be replaced by one made of plastic, as he
began doing elsewhere on Warren last year.

HPD's new parking signs are DPW's responsibility.
Theoretically speaking, of course.