Baltimore has a plan to pave 25 lane miles and fill 25,000 potholes

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott introduced during his State of the City address a program called "Repave Baltimore," which will reimagine how the city resurfaces roads.

Scott said the new plan uses analysis of all city roads so workers have up-to-date information and a public website to track progress. You can check out the progress here.

"I know this is a point of frustration for everybody in Baltimore, and I do mean everybody," Scott said. "Yes, during the Great Recession, the State cut our funding to the tune of $900 million and never put it back. I don't control the State budget, but while we continue to work with our State partners to maintain the funding we have, there are steps we can and will take to improve our resurfacing program. Repave will be a complete reimagining of our resurfacing program, from top to bottom." 

The mayor also challenged city agencies to a 90-day sprint starting in mid-April. The Department of Transportation will pave 25 lane miles of road and fill 25,000 potholes. 

Baltimore City Recreation and Parks will clean, weed, and mulch 500 tree pits, and the Department of Public Works (DPW) will sweep 25,000 miles of road, complete 6,000 graffiti removals, and 12,000 bulk waste pickups. 

In his budget, Scott also set aside $300 million for various transportation projects, including road work, paving, and potholes.

Drivers hope for better roads in Baltimore

Drivers in Baltimore know the feeling of hitting potholes while in the city.

"Rotors and axels all the way around my car because I ran into a pothole and then my front-end stabilizers was off. I kicked out some money," Crystal Carter said.

Potholes are still causing headaches for drivers, who are having to shell out money to fix damage to their cars.

"It's a little bit like an obstacle course," Lori Baylin told WJZ.

Neighbors said they hope the roads are fully repaved, not just patchwork repairs.

"It's a big challenge because it obviously stops traffic for so long, but then a resurface so it's not bumpy all around," Baylin said.

"Park Heights Avenue, it's half done, and then the rest of is like potholes or whatever, so…just do all of all the streets that need to be done," Carter said. "They really need to fix these powers because it's ridiculous, they take your whole front off."