Pacific Beach Middle School students Rex Mehran and Mason Morgan recently gave a presentation to Pacific Beach Town Council about road conditions and potholes on Ingraham Street they documented during a survey they completed for a school project.

“The goal of our project is to have the city finally listen about the true problems of our community, and finally get Ingraham Street repaved,” Mehran told Beach & Bay Press after PB Town Council’s April meeting. “Not only do we want Ingraham Street repaved, but we also want this to be a wake-up call to finally fix all the roads in our city.”

“I love to see students getting active with their community fast and early,” said Marcella Bothwell, PB Town Council president in introducing the middle school pair at the April 20 meeting.

Characterizing Ingraham as “the funkiest road in our community,” Mehran told the town council trustees, “I can’t even ride my bike on it, even though there are bike lanes, because drivers are swerving to try and avoid the potholes, especially at night, and the big puddles of water during rainstorms.”

Mehran also pointed out that 55% of San Diego’s roads are considered poor, and that there are 33,000 traffic fatalities in the U.S. annually, one-third of which are caused by poor road conditions.

Mehran said he was prompted to do an Ingraham pothole survey because he’s lived on the street his entire life, and noticed how the road’s condition impacts everyone.

“I was tired of seeing the road look torn apart every time I walked out of my house,” he said adding the road “has also always been an issue for our safety and others around us. Car wrecks have always been frequent, and damage to our vehicles. And this made me think to myself, ‘This does not seem like America’s finest city.’”

During the meeting, Morgan discussed how he and Mehran worked to document poor road conditions on Ingraham, going out to collect trash in bags and measure the depth and width of potholes with a yardstick. “It’s alarming,” he said. “In one of the cracked potholes, we found pieces of metal that were road hazards. We also found dangerous sections of the sidewalk. We found a pothole that was 3-feet wide and 5-inches deep.”

Mehran’s learned that “you have to be the voice and speak up whenever there is an issue.”

He added, “I have also learned that even something small can have the biggest change, and maybe this inspires others to speak up against something they’ve noticed that is wrong in their community.”

Mehran said his main concern, though, “is that hundreds to thousands of people drive on the road every day, and with a road in this state of disarray, more people will suffer the consequences of the dangerous road. Whether it’s your car’s alignment, tires, or even getting into wrecks, everyone inside and outside our community is facing the consequences.”

Mehran praised Pacific Beach Middle, noting the school “teaches us skills and helps prepare us for our future and success. Since PBMS is an International Baccalaureate school, they have every eighth-grader complete a community service project.”

Mehran added that PBMS encourages projects like theirs that involve solving issues in the local community. He noted his school’s teachers also promote community-service projects.

“I give my thanks to Mrs. Hensen for guiding me through this, and Ms. McElroy for teaching me how to be the best leader,” he said.

The efforts of the middle school duo and their pothole survey are paying off. They said District 2 Councilmember Dr. Jen Campbell has sent a message that “she wants to speak to them soon.”

HOW TO WITHSTAND POTHOLES?

Pothole-caused vehicle damages can be expensive. Tire replacements cost $75-$300, bent wheels between $50 and $500, and a suspension system damaged by rough roads can run as high as $5,000.

So are all vehicles equally vulnerable to potholes? No, they aren’t. Some are designed to withstand rough pavement, and some just have characteristics that favor pothole resilience. Those characteristics include having a heavy body (trucks and SUVs get the advantage), and long-travel suspension. The most pothole-resilient vehicle brands, not including vehicles rated for off-road toughness, are Honda, Toyota, Hyundai, Nissan, Kia, Mitsubishi, Mini, Suzuki, Ford, and Mazda.

When it comes to tires, the bigger the sidewalls (the distance between the wheel rim and the pavement) the more likely the tire will survive a pothole hit without the rim cutting into the rubber.

Source: Pothole.info