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01-23-2025, 07:31 PM
(This post was last modified: 01-23-2025, 10:11 PM by Obie.)
I'm going to try this again. I posted about Hawaii roads and their terrible condition but someone hijacked my post and made it about them and HPPOA not maintaining roads.
This is about how the roads get the way they are.
Nbr 1
Hawaii is nbr 1 for lousy roads.
https://www.autoblog.com/news/which-stat...ted-states
Nbr 2 :
Large trucks cause most of the damage :
http://www.ililani.media/2020/02/hawaii-...truck.html
Nbr 3 :
Roads cost every resident more that $760.00 year in damage to their vehicles.
https://www.kitv.com/news/study-shows-40...0f3bc.html
There are many more surveys but Hawaii is always rated between 1 and 5.
Some other causes cited by other studies, millions of tourists, weather ( sun damage and flooding rainfall ) and earthquakes.
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01-24-2025, 12:50 AM
(This post was last modified: 01-24-2025, 01:13 AM by Punaperson.)
One combination of factors that contributes to potholes and side-of-the-pavement erosion is the high rainfall and how it fills up small lava tubes that then bubble up to the surface.
When the roads for OLE were first plotted out ( by someone sitting at desk in Honolulu ), they neglected to factor in that there is an intermittent stream that rises at the intersection of Auli'i and 40th when it is raining very hard in what is now Hawaiian Acres, Fern Acres, etc. There were times when we joked about taking a kayak down the resulting rapids. Further down the hill, before any of Auli'i was paved, large puddles and potholes would consistently appear in specific spots, again because lava tubes close to the surface filled up and spilled over. This is where we now deal with huge pot holes in the chip seal. On what used to be the edge of an a'a flow between 39th and 40th, ( again on Auli'i ) the sun can be out overhead, but if the clouds are letting loose higher up the hill, small rivulets of water can be flowing down, and eating away at the edges of the asphalt.
I know that each subdivision has different terrain and rainfall, so what I've described above will not be relevant to all, but I wanted to bring up some of the unique factors that create problems and put us at or near the top of of these surveys.
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A good friend of ours is an engineer with the Illinois Toll Way.
Several months ago, he and his wife visited us here and while they did get to enjoy several days of that great Hilo sun and all, they also got to experience a few days of some good Hilo rain. It was one of those periods over a few days when we got 10 plus inches of rain.
Our friend made a comment to us one day was that he was utterly surprised at considering the weather extreme he witnessed in 12 days he was here at how good the condition of the roads were. (I'm talking paved roads - they did find our trek into the Acres quite comical)
Needless to say, he was quite amazed at the "run off" of the water he saw and how it not only goes over the road in "sheets" but that it also runs underneath the road. Then when the sun came out and the heat hits it. "Recipe for disaster" was all he could say! (Well, that's an engineer for you)
He was, as much as I hate to say it, very impressed with the condition of our roads! Imagine that.
This coming from an engineer who designs and builds roads that see 1.5 plus million vehicles a day and has temperature variances from plus 90 in the summer to -20 in the winter, plus the rain they do get as well as the snow, along with ton after ton of calcium chloride spread all over them and then snowplows!
"Make Orwell Fiction Again"
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(01-24-2025, 01:28 AM)HiloJulie Wrote: A good friend of ours is an engineer with the Illinois Toll Way.
Several months ago, he and his wife visited us here and while they did get to enjoy several days of that great Hilo sun and all, they also got to experience a few days of some good Hilo rain. It was one of those periods over a few days when we got 10 plus inches of rain.
Our friend made a comment to us one day was that he was utterly surprised at considering the weather extreme he witnessed in 12 days he was here at how good the condition of the roads were. (I'm talking paved roads - they did find our trek into the Acres quite comical)
Needless to say, he was quite amazed at the "run off" of the water he saw and how it not only goes over the road in "sheets" but that it also runs underneath the road. Then when the sun came out and the heat hits it. "Recipe for disaster" was all he could say! (Well, that's an engineer for you)
He was, as much as I hate to say it, very impressed with the condition of our roads! Imagine that.
This coming from an engineer who designs and builds roads that see 1.5 plus million vehicles a day and has temperature variances from plus 90 in the summer to -20 in the winter, plus the rain they do get as well as the snow, along with ton after ton of calcium chloride spread all over them and then snowplows! The primary roads are not bad at all IMO. In the subdivisions, basically if people would slow the fawk down then the roads would n't deteriorate so rapidly. Good luck with that!
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"In the subdivisions, basically if people would slow the fawk down then the roads would n't deteriorate so rapidly. Good luck with that!"
Thats the beauty of Hawaiian Acres roads. We have built in speed bumps - both conventional and inverted and they all came naturally and the best yet - FREE!
"Make Orwell Fiction Again"
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“Recipe for disaster" was all he could say! (Well, that's an engineer for you)
But do our road engineers even follow that weather + design recipe? Or wing it?
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(01-24-2025, 02:47 AM)HiloJulie Wrote: "In the subdivisions, basically if people would slow the fawk down then the roads would n't deteriorate so rapidly. Good luck with that!"
Thats the beauty of Hawaiian Acres roads. We have built in speed bumps - both conventional and inverted and they all came naturally and the best yet - FREE!
Acres side roads need designations similar to "good", "better" and "best" but in the opposite direction.
"bad", "worse", "terrible"?
Yes, slowing down traffic is certainly a blessing in disguise but ya better check those steering and suspension parts on a yearly basis.
If Lex Brodies tells an Acres resident that a ball joint is worn out then in this case they're probably not lying for a change.
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"Yes, slowing down traffic is certainly a blessing in disguise but ya better check those steering and suspension parts on a yearly basis."
Good advice! We do it several times a year to be honest.
But having said that, even if your Acres roads are terrible, if you're wearing out your suspension in a year, you are either driving in and out of the Acres way too much or going to fast or both.
"Make Orwell Fiction Again"
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(01-26-2025, 01:25 AM)HiloJulie Wrote: "Yes, slowing down traffic is certainly a blessing in disguise but ya better check those steering and suspension parts on a yearly basis."
Good advice! We do it several times a year to be honest.
But having said that, even if your Acres roads are terrible, if you're wearing out your suspension in a year, you are either driving in and out of the Acres way too much or going to fast or both.
Right. My thought was that, assuming you're NOT replacing parts every year, they need to be watched on a regular basis for wear.
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