Robert from Aurora & John from Denver writes, “What's driving you crazy? Why do some streets have manhole covers right in the path of your tires? Why can't the road crews put the sewer system in the center of a lane, so you don't need to drive over the covers? They are also 1 to 2 inches, sometimes more, below the surface of the pavement. There are rings that the road workers can install over the manhole covers. Eventually, everyone has to get their car aligned.”
This is one of my driving pet peeves, too. I can’t imagine anyone who likes that feeling of hitting those, sometimes deep manholes.
I was told by the engineers at the Aurora Public Works Department as well as by Aurora Water that they don’t put manholes intentionally in the path of your tires. They drive over the same roads you do and avoid those, sometimes serious dips just like you do. The issue they say is that most roadways have a large number of utilities competing for limited space underground and it is not feasible to achieve that level of design precision to keep the manholes right under your vehicle.
Another complication is when roadways are widened or re-configured over time, it would be cost prohibitive to attempt to relocate all the manholes to avoid wheel paths within a newly reconfigured roadway.
As for the dip down when you ride over one of those manholes, the City of Aurora Roadway Specifications calls for utility manholes and access covers to be flush with the finished pavement, +/- a quarter of an inch. When a problem cover is reported, Public Works and Aurora Water will coordinate to raise or replace their manholes and valve covers during street overlay work or if they settle and cause an issue. I’m told that the majority of the calls they receive about low manholes, the covers are owned by another utility like gas, electric, telecom, etc. In those cases, the city of Aurora cannot smooth them out so the bump remains.
The best they can do, they tell me, is report the issue to the outside utilities when they are made aware a problem and continue to follow up.
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Another place I’ve seen this problem is around the town of Parker, especially on eastbound Hess Road east of Jordan Road. Traffic engineers with the Parker Engineering and Public Works Department tell me they try as best they can to locate utility manholes in the center of the road but admit that sometimes when a roadway has so many underground utilities, it makes it difficult to locate every manhole outside of the path of your wheels.
“Our roads are often times full of underground utilities including water lines, sanitary sewer, stormwater, electric, gas and telecommunication cable/wires. Many of these utilities require minimum horizontal separation to meet safety and health requirements. Parker’s Engineering staff reviews roadway plans for both capital improvement projects and development projects with this objective in mind.”
Parker also has criteria that manholes must be minimally recessed from the pavement surface to improve drivability. But as we all know, pavement over time settles and breaks up around manholes and that can impact the driving surface.
“Our Streets Division typically repair and adjust manholes as part of pavement overlay projects, however, if a manhole needs immediate attention they can be repaired sooner. We encourage residents to contact the Town of Parker Public Works Department if they notice manholes that are in need of repair.”
There are several ways to report problem spots in Parker from the town website. In the City of Aurora, you can report any road problem from bad manholes to damaged sidewalks on the Aurora right-of-way maintenance page.
Denver7 traffic anchor Jayson Luber says he has been covering Denver-metro traffic since Ben-Hur was driving a chariot. (We believe the actual number is over 25 years.) He's obsessed with letting viewers know what's happening on their drive and the best way to avoid the problems that spring up. Follow him on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram or listen to his Driving You Crazy podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Spotify or Podbean.
