Thursday, May 18, 2023

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


6 comments:

  1. LOL, filled out of embarrassment, not any other reason! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Cornwall Highways said the work had been done “by persons unknown, without consent”

    A public road being repaired by a member of the public. Who needs consent? Why would they (1) have any basis for investigating who did this, and (2) why would they want to? Are they embarrassed? Shamed? Maybe they want to offer that person a job?

    Cornwall Highways needs to have its management fired for trying to retaliate. And they ought to reopen the road immediately, since it is clear they closed it again out of shear spite.

    I recall a story about someplace that the potholes were being repaired and painted with advertisements by a pizza business. Michigan, maybe? And that wasn't the first time. Cornwall, get your heads out of your asses and do your job.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ummm... You *do* realize these are bureaucrats? In Britain? They don' *do* no steenkin' "head out of ass". And they don' *do* no steenkin' "job".

    ReplyDelete
  4. A long time ago, there was a pothole very close to my driveway, in the middle of the road. Several feet in diameter, with smooth edges. A sinkhole, perhaps? Very annoying when on a motorcycle. I sprayed a red paint stripe around the edge, to make it more noticeable, so I could avoid it.

    Two days later it was fixed. Coincidence?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Bureaucrat: Someone afraid that somebody is doing something without permission.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Do any of us remember the time Domino's Pizza hired crews and equipment to start fixing potholes themselves, and painting them with their logo?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrGPwvcURQk

    ReplyDelete

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