View heading towards I26 by Food Lion
Two weeks ago, DOT let me know what was causing the issues that made our road seem like we were driving in a 3rd world country. And ironically, while I was away last week IN a 3rd world country for a mission trip, DOT called to let me know work would be done this week.
Many have already seen (driven) the work and – like most things in life – most are happy, others are still not.
What was done is only temporary until the permanent fix can be put on a state project list and take place.
What is that permanent fix? In layman’s terms “ripping up the entire road…10 inches deep!!….and laying new foundation, layers, etc”. The engineers at DOT say this stretch has an unusual amount of moisture that keeps finding it’s way through the layers and causing “pockets” in the road.
You’ll remember 2 years ago the road was smooth as a baby’s bottom….and then, after time, pockets started popping up.
Projects of this magnitude usually take 2 years to get approved. I’m hopefully I can work with DOT to get on the list sooner than that…but, things don’t happen as quickly as I’d like sometimes.
It’s not perfect, but it’s better than what we had. Let’s see how the current patch work holds up over the next year. As a tightwad, I’m always concerned about costs and that’s why as much as it pains me to hear, ripping the whole thing up to finally resolve the problem may be best for our cars/families…and tax payer dollars. But doing it once, compared to multiple patches year after year, would save money.
The area near Bookie Richardson Road needs an immediate fix. Avoiding damage, that could have been avoided had DOT done their due diligence, is causing vehicles to veer dangerously close to oncoming traffic or run off the shoulder of the road. These moisture issues, as well as others such as alligator cracking and holes remaining after milling, should have been known and fixed prior to microsurfacing, or precluded microsurfacing as a viable option. The road started to fail in less than a year and was patched. Like most patching I’ve seen DOT perform in the area, it also failed within a short time. Unless root causes are identified and addressed, any work done, like all the work done previously, will be a complete waste of time and taxpayer money.
2 weeks since this update and only a very small portion, with minimal delamination, has been fixed. While we wait on this fine example of SCDOT engineering to be fixed, the holes continue to get worse and more likelihood of a serious accident occurring. Stop asking and start demanding that SCDOT get their act together. In the meantime the SCDOT Secretary gets a $60k raise for her outstanding work of maintaining the state of the “worst roads in America”. It’s past time for legislators to do what they were elected to do instead of passing on the same old excuses given by inept agencies in SC.