POTHOLES – DON’T YOU JUST HATE THEM?

We have all experienced it – a large thump as one’s vehicle hits a pothole. Usually it is to late to avoid the pothole or it has is ‘camouflaged’ by being filled with water or covered with snow.

It seems that instead of repairing our roads the authorities are more interested in building new ones and only repairing existing ones when absolutely necessary. Does that make sense?

That is why a app for my mobile ‘phone caught my attention. Using Potholer is simple. The best results are achieved when the phone is placed in a secure horizontal position, such as the cradle used for GPS devices in a vehicle and all potholes above a certain depth are automatically recorded, using GPS, and the relevant local authority notified. This has the beneficial effect of the accumulation of the location and severity of potholes means that those responsible for maintaining our roads cannot claim not to know about a particular pothole. Don’t forget to launch  the app!

There is one downside: using the Pothole can significantly deplete one’s mobile ‘phone battery. Nice of them to make that clear but if connected to a charging (‘cigar’) port that should not be an issue. That said, one needs also to be aware of mobile connection charges and upload and download limits.

For more information see: www.potholer.info 

PS, since this piece was written the potholer app has not been updated and so one can no longer have potholes reported to a Local Authority, pity that…