CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — It’s a problem that faces Corpus Christi residents on many of the city’s streets: potholes.
The city of Corpus Christi is fixing potholes through their pothole program and right now the city is undergoing a pothole blitz. The pothole blitz lasts for about a month, ending in June, and the city is hoping to fix potholes in areas that are affected the most.
Jesse Goen, a resident of Flour Bluff, said he’s been dealing with potholes in his street for about twenty years. He said they are ruining his car’s tries and his car’s alignment.
“Most of the roads out here. You can't just drive with a cup of coffee in your hand. You’ll just be wearing it,” Goen said.
He said he feels the city is not addressing the problem and had been calling the city to repair the potholes years go, but gave up when he didn’t get an answer.
“Until they actually drive down the streets there’s not any way they’re going to be able to know which ones are needing repair and which ones are not,” he said.
However, the city is encouraging citizens to call through their hotline number at (361)826-2489 and use the 'My City' app to report potholes.
“We also want the citizens to call in more proactively so that helps us where to target…where to go,” Rolando Mata, the assistant director of the public works operation team said.
He said the city just acquired new pothole spray patchers and new pothole trucks in addition to retraining staff. He said the staff is now trying to fix potholes in two days as opposed to six.
He said so far the city has fixed nearly 7,000 potholes through the blitz and 65,000 overall through the program with a goal of fixing 100,000. The program is costing tax payers about one million dollars.
“We only have allotted funding for our rehab program but we also look at where we’re going to get the best bang for our buck,” Mata said.
However, Gabriel Garcia, a resident of Corpus Christi, said the city repaired potholes in his neighborhood last month and they are already ruined. He said he calls the city and it takes them months to repair the potholes.
“We’ve been getting the same run arounds and they’ll be saying we’ll get a crew out there and then we won’t see anybody for a good two or three months come out,” Garcia said.
Garcia said that he notices the potholes get worse when the weather is bad or it rains.
“I’ve noticed when it rains the drainage system here doesn’t really work and I’ve noticed all the potholes that have been getting patched are just breaking up with the influx of rain that we’ve been getting,” Garcias said.
Mata acknowledged that weather can be a problem once they have fixed the potholes.
“Pavement will deteriorate in any fashion. It could be weather, it could be the sun, it could just be the humidity…anything to affect more rain,” Mata said.
He said the pothole program will be ongoing every year.
