New Jersey crews deploy ‘pothole-killing’ technology

You don’t have to travel very far before you see them on the roads. And you’re not mistaken — it’s a bumper year with more potholes than usual marking the region’s streets and highways.

Repairing potholes is the priority for highway maintenance crews this spring, said New Jersey Department of Transportation Commissioner Jamie Fox.

“We have already filled more than 180,000 potholes in this fiscal year, and we’ll repair nearly 300,000, which is almost twice the number we have in an average year,” Fox said Tuesday.

The harsh winter weather caused water to seep into cracks and freeze, breaking up the pavement, and resulting in an extraordinary number of potholes.

Repair crews are deploying “pothole killing” machines that use a mix of hot asphalt to fill the holes, Fox said. As asphalt plants reopen this spring, they’ll switch to asphalt for repairing individual potholes and repave sections of heavily pockmarked roads.

In Pennsylvania, PennDOT officials encourage drivers to report pothole locations on state roads by calling 1-800-FIX-ROAD.

And, in Delaware, nearly 90 employees are typically dedicated statewide to road repairs potholes during the pothole season.