Saturday, May 05, 2007

Erosion After Rain and Metro's Gravel on the Brain


I warned Metro Paving Manager Don Reid over the phone recently about the storm run-off problems on Hume St. I also predicted that the next good gully-washer would erode loose gravel that was part of the gravel/tar mixture that his boys used to cover the alley between 5th Av. and 6th Av., a mixture that is cheaper than my second cousin's six-month correspondence cosmetology degree, a mixture that Metro puts down when it does not want to cough up the same asphalt that they use elsewhere (even in Spring when they say they only pave roads and don't pave alleys). I also predicted that run-off would deposit that gravel at the intersection of 5th and Hume. I wish that I could say I was wrong about my predictions, but this morning's picture (above) proves that I was right.

There is always a chance that the usual suspects, UP, LLC could again be the culprits, but I doubt it this time. They have put in a sidewalk where their dumped debris used to be, and their closest source of gravel, a driveway hitting the alley, sits back about 35' off of Hume. Metro's alley feeds right into the street, and it was loose in many places. That other down side is that, if gravel eroded off the alley, then the alley is that much closer to its devolution to a dirt road again. Are they not Metro?

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