Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 78 posts

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#51

Post by hgomersall »

vasco wrote: post #21
Developer_Tom wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, fuel duty does bring in a lot of money, but it doesn’t go directly into fixing the roads—it generally goes into the government’s general budget. Local councils who are responsible for fixing the roads have been underfunded for years and is normally the area that gets squeezed the most. The British weather doesn’t help too with constant rain and freezing winters…

No specific tax in any country funds things directly. It's just a ploy to get people to accept new taxes. Every tax is whatever % it is of the global tax revenue and that's it, and if you know what a tax dollar is used for you can look at the overall budget of expenses. For example, if I say I will create a tax to protect the children, exclusively used to fund orphanages, you go oh man that sounds great. But you alre…

Taxes don't pay for things at all in a monetarily sovereign country. The spending happens from new money creation. The tax (among other things) is about resource liberation to prevent inflationary pressure.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#52

Post by Eavolution »

socks wrote: post #17
noja wrote: post #2

That’s good news, but why are the roads in the UK so bad to start with? Is it correct to say that roads are funded from a tax on fuel sales?

At least in the towns and cities, I believe it is because the utility companies can cut up the roads, but the cuts are never repaired to the same quality, allowing water ingress and creating weaknesses that seem to 'seed' potholes. I used to live in Edinburgh and the roads were like an uneven tar patchwork.

Where we lived the road was very country, grass up the middle etc. A gas company went to put mains gas in, and they made such a bad job of the road it was almost undrivable. The council actually made them go back and resurface it fully, after that the road's one of the best around, certainly for the size of it.

The damage that gas company did to it and the state they left it in after putting the gas in though was atrocious.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#53

Post by standardUser »

xandrius wrote: post #30
liendolucas wrote: post #25

In Italy (Perugia) not only huge and dangerous potholes (is a disaster overall) but sidewalks maintenance is pretty much abandoned as well. I drive a motorcycle and instead of paying attention to driving I have to put considerable effort looking at the road because I know that if a drive over one of those I'll end up in the ground for sure.

To be fair, terrible roads might reduce accidents, reduce speeds, unnecessary vehicle usage, and turn the usual road rage into rage against the road, creating a bond between different drivers rather than antagonism. And it's also a net positive for mechanics and parts manufacturers. Basically a win-win for society (except for drivers, ofc). (partly /s and partly not, as I surprised myself realising how bad roads migh…

I think that's a stretch. The nations with the best road/transit systems and the most law-abiding drivers are invariably the most prosperous.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#54

Post by liendolucas »

xandrius wrote: post #30
liendolucas wrote: post #25

In Italy (Perugia) not only huge and dangerous potholes (is a disaster overall) but sidewalks maintenance is pretty much abandoned as well. I drive a motorcycle and instead of paying attention to driving I have to put considerable effort looking at the road because I know that if a drive over one of those I'll end up in the ground for sure.

To be fair, terrible roads might reduce accidents, reduce speeds, unnecessary vehicle usage, and turn the usual road rage into rage against the road, creating a bond between different drivers rather than antagonism. And it's also a net positive for mechanics and parts manufacturers. Basically a win-win for society (except for drivers, ofc). (partly /s and partly not, as I surprised myself realising how bad roads migh…

Yeah, no... In Argentina when you see two cars that collided, or rolled killing almost complete families due to road conditions, that doesn't seem to fit as a win-win for society.

Roads and sidewalks have to be properly maintained, otherwise do not charge me taxes for my license's plate.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#55

Post by MarcelOlsz »

thumbletown wrote: post #28
MarcelOlsz wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I single-handedly got the mayor of my small town to fill in a bunch of potholes on a road leading to my parents place. I have an old car and while the suspension is great, it's destroyed the bottom of my car and multiple valences costing me a lot since it sits so low. I started calling the mayor every single day and we ended up talking for a few hours. Nothing got done until I distributed flyers and went knocking on…

Could the mayor have been better focusing their time and efforts on broader issues, rather than just to stop a bunch of people from repeatedly calling him?

Probably not seeing as the roads are abysmal and there's only a few hundred people here.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#56

Post by walthamstow »

Reason077 wrote: post #27
walthamstow wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Council grants from central govt cut ~40% during austerity too. Pothole fixing and road resurfacing are such an easy choice to cut from budgets because the effect is indirect and isn't immediately seen. People would notice very quickly if their bins weren't being collected.

> ”People would notice very quickly if their bins weren't being collected.” This was a constant problem at my London council. They collected our rubbish bin reliably, but never our council-supplied recycling bin. Eventually we found out that the rules had changed and recycling had to be put in specially marked clear plastic bags, but the bags were almost impossible to get. You literally had to go to the local library…

Tower Hamlets is absolutely the worst borough in London. It's dirty and it stinks - and that's just the election results! They make bankrupt Croydon look respectable.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#57

Post by vasco »

hgomersall wrote: post #51
vasco wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No specific tax in any country funds things directly. It's just a ploy to get people to accept new taxes. Every tax is whatever % it is of the global tax revenue and that's it, and if you know what a tax dollar is used for you can look at the overall budget of expenses. For example, if I say I will create a tax to protect the children, exclusively used to fund orphanages, you go oh man that sounds great. But you alre…

Taxes don't pay for things at all in a monetarily sovereign country. The spending happens from new money creation. The tax (among other things) is about resource liberation to prevent inflationary pressure.

I realize that and agree with this modern view on monetary policy but you cannot say they are totally divorced concepts because deficits do get accounted for based on difference between money raised with taxes and money spent.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#59

Post by thatguy0900 »

thumbletown wrote: post #28
MarcelOlsz wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I single-handedly got the mayor of my small town to fill in a bunch of potholes on a road leading to my parents place. I have an old car and while the suspension is great, it's destroyed the bottom of my car and multiple valences costing me a lot since it sits so low. I started calling the mayor every single day and we ended up talking for a few hours. Nothing got done until I distributed flyers and went knocking on…

Could the mayor have been better focusing their time and efforts on broader issues, rather than just to stop a bunch of people from repeatedly calling him?

How much time and effort do you think it takes the mayor himself to authorize a crew to repair potholes? He's not going to go do it himself. Hopefully the government will already know how much it costs to repair a given length of road.

Re: Farewell potholes? UK team invents self-healing road surface

#60

Post by bcraven »

consp wrote: post #40
picafrost wrote: post #14

> The material could be scaled up for use on British roads in a couple of years, the researchers believe. As per usual these optimistic solutions are inhibited by cost. All municipalities that I’ve lived in have ignored potholes until the complainants become a choir. It is always cheaper this way.

If you do not fill cracks in roads you get potholes. Lack of cheap maintenance causes expensive repairs and reduces the lifespan of a road. Typical shortsightedness. If you see black lines in an asphalt road (which are not straight) the odds are good you have a municipality which does maintenance.

These repairs are never carried out in the UK, crack repair simply isn't a thing over here.
Post reply on HN