The Hidden Costs of Filling the Same Pothole Every Year

July 22, 2026

** A note about the image above: if I ever witnessed one of my workers filling a pothole while it had stones and sand in it, I would lose my shit. That's a waste of blacktop and it's never going to adhere. That pothole is too shallow anyway. The "repair" is replacing a divot with a speed bump. Anyway, I digress. Every highway department has them. The potholes that seem almost immortal. You fill them in the spring, patch them again after a heavy rain, revisit them a few weeks la…continue

The Dharma of the Pothole: What Buddha Might Have Taught Highway Departments About Road Repair

July 3, 2026

There is an old saying among highway workers: "The pothole you filled yesterday is the pothole that returns tomorrow." While this saying was almost certainly not uttered by Buddha beneath the Bodhi tree, one suspects he would have understood it immediately. After all, few things illustrate the nature of existence quite like pothole repair. The First Noble Truth: Roads Suffer Buddha taught that suffering is an unavoidable part of life. Highway superintendents might phrase it slightly di…continue

Why Every Highway Department Should Own an Asphalt Hot Box

July 3, 2026

There are very few pieces of equipment that can pay for themselves as quickly as an asphalt hot box. Many small highway departments view hot boxes as equipment reserved for counties, cities, or large paving contractors. In reality, an asphalt hot box may be one of the most valuable and cost-effective pieces of road maintenance equipment a small town can own. Whether your municipality maintains 20 miles of road or 200, potholes do not care about your budget, your staffing levels, or whether the l…continue

Understanding Road Construction Aggregates: A Highway Department Guide to Stone, Gravel, and Sand

July 3, 2026

Anyone who has worked around highway departments, contractors, or quarries quickly learns that construction aggregate terminology can be confusing. The same material may have three different names depending on the county, contractor, engineer, quarry, or generation of highway employees involved in the conversation. A superintendent may ask for "crusher run," an engineer may specify "dense graded aggregate," and the quarry invoice may list "Item 4." In many cases the…continue

How to Actually Score Pavement Condition (Without Overthinking PCI)

April 20, 2026

If you’ve spent any time trying to assign a Pavement Condition Index (PCI) score, you’ve probably run into the same problem: the road isn’t uniform. Most of it looks good, but a short section might be failing badly. Suddenly, assigning a single number feels subjective and uncomfortable. This is where many people get stuck. The truth is that PCI was never meant to produce a perfect, universally “correct” number. It is a structured way to summarize pavement condition …continue