I saw a bumper sticker a few weeks back that said something like: “I’m not drunk, I’m just avoiding potholes.” It initially made me chuckle, but after driving Deerfoot Trail on an airport run last week, I came to realize that bumper sticker was no joke.
Given that I live and work in Okotoks, I don’t have a reason to leave the community frequently, and when I do, it’s often via Stoney Trail or Macleod Trail, not Deerfoot. Those other routes have the occasional pothole but they’re nothing like the gauntlet that Deerfoot is throwing at drivers these days.
Now that my son has had two flat tires, I’m not only more aware of the damage potholes can inflict, but I’ve also become much more vigilant in my efforts to avoid them.
It must have looked like I had left the pub after last call as I did my best to avoid the endless string of craters during my Deerfoot run last week, but I imagine other drivers didn’t even notice. I suspect they were either so familiar with someone navigating the slalom course or they were paying far more attention to what dangers lurked ahead in their own lanes that my handiwork behind the wheel didn’t even register.
The irony I quickly found is that not only are potholes dangerous but so is spending too much time looking for them. I soon realized that keeping my eyes on the road, quite literally, meant I wasn’t scanning the traffic around me as much as I otherwise should have been doing, which isn’t an ideal scenario given the congestion on Deerfoot.
Hitting a pothole might well be the lesser of two evils if it means you’ve avoided slamming into the back of a vehicle that has come to an abrupt stop or didn’t see one of those aggressive mergers doing their thing.
Given all the patching visible on the highway, I can only assume that another round will ensue now that the freeze/thaw cycle is behind us, so drivers will get some relief before doing it all over again next year.
I fully admit that I’m still getting familiar with some of Alberta’s many nuances, but it seems curious to me why Deerfoot is a gong show pothole-wise when other routes aren’t anywhere near as bad. Is that a maintenance issue, something to do with volume, maybe the type of surface? Whatever the case, Deerfoot’s condition is an embarrassment.
After my drive to the airport last week, I figured I would do my tires and suspension a favour and take an alternate way home. As I took the exit onto Airport Trail so I could make my way east to Stoney Trail, the line of vehicles in front of me came to a stop. When we began inching forward, I could see the cause of the holdup: a car was pulled over to the shoulder but was sticking out enough that the inside lane couldn’t flow freely.
Once I reached the chokepoint, I saw why the car was pulled over: It had a flat tire.
