That's ridickulous!

 

Sorry about the headline, but it was the only appropriate one that came to mind after I read this report from Sussex, England.

Locals have revealed that pot holes have finally been filled in by a council - after penises were mysteriously spray-painted around them. Workers turned up on the site in East Sussex where locals were fed up with dodging massive crumbling pits - but only after someone took direct action.

Now it has been confirmed that the holes in question have been filled in. Resident Helen Carr took the pictures and explained that instead of starting to repair the road initially road sweepers were sent to clear away the drawings.

Sussex Council said it had brought forward work which has been planned - but moaned it has put ‘additional pressure on our pothole repair crews’.

. . .

... comments included “Drawn by the College’s A level art class? Still life.”

There's more at the link, including some rather phallic photographs.

Sussex Council appears to have no sense of humor - but then, bureaucrats seldom do.  They've been sitting in their office chairs for so long that the iron has entered their souls (if they possess the latter, that is . . . some would argue that bureaucrats had to sell theirs to the devil to get their positions in the first place).  As evidence, just look at recent events in Cornwall, another English county.

Highways chiefs are searching for a mystery motorist who poured concrete into a huge pothole that had forced the closure of a road for weeks.

The unknown pothole filler patched up the crater in Lostwithiel, Cornwall, on a road that had been shut since the beginning of April.

Cornwall Highways said the work had been done “by persons unknown, without consent” and urged the local community to share any information that could identify the person responsible, CornwallLive reported.

. . .

Colin Martin, Cornwall councillor for Lostwithiel and Lanreath, described the Lostwithiel pothole as “a perfect metaphor for the way that the entire public sector is crumbling due to underinvestment”.

“The latest is that the road has been closed again and will remain closed until it is 'properly' repaired by Cormac, but they say this could be weeks away as all available teams have been diverted to filling smaller potholes on roads which are still open,” he told Cornwall Live.

Again, more at the link.

We have similar problems in this country, of course, as any big-city-dweller will tell you.  It's amusing to see we also have public activism to fix them, as demonstrated recently by Arnold Schwarzenegger in California - although he filled in a utility trench rather than a pothole.  Still, the same principle applies.  Well done, sir!

Peter