By Brent Bosker

Pothole season extra bad on highways

May 22, 2011 | 3:37 PM

The government budgeted $285 million to spend on highway upgrades this year, but the province may be digging a little deeper into the public purse to fix all the damage left from spring flooding.

Some highways across the province were left battered by high spring runoff that saturated road beds, causing pavement to heave and break.

“It’s been a difficult spring, because in addition to the flooding, especially in Southern Saskatchewan, we’ve had a couple of snow events,” said Doug Wakabayashi, spokesman for the Ministry of Highways.

Highway 2 between St Louis and south of Wakaw is one of the stretches the Ministry of Highways has on its long repair list.

Broken pavement has left behind large potholes that are now guarded by numerous warning signs.

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Crews are working as hard as they can to fix these up, Wakabayashi said.

“One thing we need to ask motorist to understand, is when the roads are still wet you can’t do any kind of permanent or lasting repairs.”

Highways crews are blading gravel into the holes as a temporary fix, he said.

“In that part of the province we’re still seeing frost coming out of the roads, so once the roads dry out we’ll be in there doing what is called depatching and that will provide a much more lasting repair.”

The excessive run off this year also overwhelmed culverts, causing water to flow over highways. Water is still a problem on Highway 2, south of Wakaw, where a small lake has developed over the roadway.

“As I was driving through with my Escape the water was splashing up over the grill toward the windshield. I got though it slowly and out the other end. It was kind of fun,” said Eric Anderson, who was surprised to see the water.

Highways workers started pumping water last weekend to bring down the level, said Wakabayashi.

In the meantime, highway markers are in place helping drivers navigate through the water.

bbosker@panow.com