After pothole goes unrepaired, Arnold Schwarzenegger takes matter into his own hands
LOS ANGELES -- California's soaking wet winter may have brought the state out of drought but it left behind a big mess on the streets: Potholes.
Local streets and freeways have seen cracks and holes open up at a frantic pace this spring, leaving road crews scrambling to keep up.
Some people are tired of waiting.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, for one, decided to take matters into his own hands.
The former California governor said his neighborhood has been waiting weeks for a pothole to be fixed. So he got his hands on some Quikrete and did the work himself with help from his team.
"Today, after the whole neighborhood has been upset about this giant pothole that's been screwing up cars and bicycles for weeks, I went out with my team and fixed it," he wrote on Twitter. "I always say, let's not complain, let's do something about it. Here you go."
One neighbor drove by as he was working to thank him.
"You're welcome," he told her. "You have to do it yourself. This is crazy. For three weeks I've been waiting for this hole to be closed."
However, the Los Angeles Department of Public Works official said it's not really a pothole, but a service trench that needs to be repaired by Southern California Gas Company.
The L.A.-based utility company said because it's a concrete street and not an asphalt street, Schwarzenegger's road patch won't really work. However, on Wednesday, the company said crews leveled the patch off with compaction equipment to provide more strength to the temporary paving.
SoCalGas said work to upgrade the pipeline system on the road was completed in January 2023. Crews then applied temporary paving over the excavation.
As part of the maintenance process, the utility company said it performs permanent paving about 30 days from when the project was completed. However, the recent storms and heavy in rain the L.A. area delayed the permanent paving.
SoCalGas hopes to complete that paving by the end of this week.
LA looking to hire people to help repair potholes
