Long Island drivers pleading with local, state officials to fix potholes
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- Drivers on Long Island are demanding the state and county stop spinning their wheels on pothole repairs.
Many are paying more than $600 on repairs, and they told CBS2's Jennifer McLogan it's a safety issue, too.
Chris Riggi, of Long Island Tire, has never seen such a volume of victims.
"Damaging wheels, tires, suspensions," Riggi said, adding the damage is "very expensive."
Steven Legum hit a crater in his Tesla and cracked the suspension.
"It was about 7 feet by 5 feet, and the spot in front where I hit must have been close to a foot deep," he said.
It is a bone-rattling, eye-popping, teeth-chattering, treacherous drive on the Long Island Expressway and beyond.
"The fact they are only doing patchwork, it's like putting a Band-Aid on a gaping wound," pothole victim Vincent Michael said.
Aging roads and temporary fixes don't help.
"When you start off with lousy roads, it's really easy to get potholes, especially given the weather that we've had," AAA Northeast spokesman Robert Sinclair said.
Fluctuating temperatures on an island with loads of water.
"We have a freeze-thaw constantly throughout the winter and when water gets under the asphalt, with the heavy congestion we have in our region, that causes the potholes and breaks up the asphalt," said Marc Herbst, with the Long Island Contractors' Association.
If Gov. Kathy Hochul's proposed statewide war on potholes is approved, $100 million to fight potholes will kick in in the next fiscal year.
Meanwhile, once a bid is approved to repave the Long Island Expressway, work can begin in the spring.
"The sealing of the joints, the state has changed the specifications for that, so it should be more reliant moving forward when we put new asphalt down," Herbst said.
But who to pay for pothole damage from winter?
Sen. Alexis Weik is sponsoring a bill to make the state liable year-round. Currently, drivers cannot make claims from November to May.
"The trucks beat the daylights out of the roads," Sinclair said.
Since there is no rail-freight tunnel, Long Island gets 96% of its freight by truck -- it's a pothole paradise.
