A hole lot of anger over Wagga roads

It comes as readers compared council to Lloyd and Larry from Dumb and Dumber, imploring them to get outside “shovel in hand” to fix the strip of bitumen that is “more pothole than road”.

“It’s pretty awful,” Galore woman Kay Geppart said.

“I come from Galore – and we know all about potholes. When they fix it, Wagga City Council might want to come and fix ours.”

The state of the city’s road network was put under the spotlight last week when a disgruntled commuter revealed he had an unresolved complaint about a pothole on Holbrook Road stretching as far back as November.

Council moved to fix the section of Holbrook Road at the weekend after concerns were made public.

Prompted by council’s invitation to report more dodgy roads, Fitzhardinge Street attracted the most amount of concern online.

The high traffic Central road contains several potholes adjacent to the Baylis Centre and uneven patchwork making for a bumpy ride to the Morgan Street intersection.

A council spokesman said the road is slated to be fixed this year but “exact timing” depended on sporting events at nearby Robertson Oval.

He said the road was in “good structural condition” but needed a new layer of bitumen and base material.

As part of upgrades across the network, council has resurfaced several roads including Bourkelands Drive, Kaloona Drive and Clifton Street.

Some of the upgrades raised the ire of readers who argued there were more pressing needs.

“Come and live in Bourkelands,” one person wrote. 

“Just had a 70 meter section re-tarred in Bourkelands Drive for absolutely no reason what so ever. What a waste of resource (sic)”

The council spokesman did not answer why those particular roads had been resurfaced, but a statement last week said priority of works was catalogued based on condition and risk.

The road network is expected to deteriorate in wetter months.