Roads suffering from frost

[The Premier]

I have a question? Is it possible for asphalt to bulge up due to the freeze and thawing? 

I know that they cause potholes, but what causes it to bulge up. I am asking this because on one local road near where I live, there is a sign saying "FROST DAMAGE."

[corco]

I have a question? Is it possible for asphalt to bulge up due to the freeze and thawing? 

I know that they cause potholes, but what causes it to bulge up. I am asking this because on one local road near where I live, there is a sign saying "FROST DAMAGE."

Yep, we call them frost heaves up here- the soil under the road contracts when it freezes and then expands, creating a layer of ice under the road, causing bumps to develop in places where the drainage isn't perfect.

Here's a picture from wiki that explains it pretty well http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frost_heaving#mediaviewer/File:Freezing_air_ice_lens_formation.jpg

[1995hoo]

The Trans-Canada Highway in Newfoundland once upon a time had such a problem with frost heaves that they were repairing the road every summer (I remember a prolonged stretch of gravel south of Corner Brook where "annual repaving" was underway). Supposedly the people who built the road in the early 1960s had a slogan: "Finish the drive in '65, begin the fix in '66."

[Pete from Boston]

You may have seen this sign:



It's too bad this team didn't get promoted here, or they might not have failed.  The first road-sign-themed sports outfit I've seen since the Kankakee No Turn On Reds of the AHL:

[ET21]

My street had that issue during the winter after it was resurfaced. They had to redo it again the following summer

[signalman]

My street is frost heaved very badly.  It's like driving across a wash board.  Add in some potholes and you also get to do a slalom as you avoid said potholes.  Oh, the joys of winter and what it does to the infrastructure.

[DrSmith]

Happens most every winter here in Mass.  Once things warm up, it will settle back down and smooth out some, but cracks in the pavement are there and ready to accelerate pothole formation

[cl94]

That's New York. And Vermont. And New Hampshire. And Maine...

[AsphaltPlanet]

Our roads are pretty heaved right now.  On some sections of some roads, it can almost be hard to do the speed limit.  Generally the freeways are fine, its the sideroads that suffer.  By in large though, once the frost comes out the ground, the heaves subside, and the roads are miraculously smooth once again.

[Pete from Boston]

The roads here are the worst I have seen them from winter in a few years.  The heaves are particularly bad in places–note the hard drop on Mass. 16 East at 93 if you're there–and the potholes are predictably multiplying with a few warm days this past week to let ice loose and water in (promptly refreezing, of course).

[AsphaltPlanet]

^ There have been spring times in the past where the potholes got so bad along major freeways that the surface course of asphalt needed to be milled off, without being surfaced again for several months.

[GCrites]

Frost slowly brings rocks to the surface of the Earth.

[spooky]

The roads here are the worst I have seen them from winter in a few years.  The heaves are particularly bad in places–note the hard drop on Mass. 16 East at 93 if you're there–and the potholes are predictably multiplying with a few warm days this past week to let ice loose and water in (promptly refreezing, of course).

Imagine what it's going to be like with a week of 40+ degrees and more melting.

The parking lot at work is going to swallow up a car one of these days.

[froggie]

That's most Northern states...

FTFY

[1995hoo]

You may have seen this sign:



It's too bad this team didn't get promoted here, or they might not have failed.  The first road-sign-themed sports outfit I've seen since the Kankakee No Turn On Reds of the AHL:

Funny timing on this–the latest issue of Sports Illustrated has an article about the Vermont Frost Heaves, written by the team's former owner (who was an SI writer before and after his basketball foray). He mentions how one nice thing about the name is that the yellow "Frost Heaves" warning signs allowed them to circumvent the state's ban on billboards. 

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear to be available via their website. The article does note that Frost Heaves memorabilia is still available online.

[SectorZ]

NH in some places has a small warning sign of "Frost Heaves" where it gets bad. One winter, I forget the year but within the past decade, NH 10 from Keene to Newport may have been one of the worst things I had ever driven on. The road is frequently 50 MPH speed limit in places, driving that (especially in the dark) it was a challenge to safely go 30-35. By the summer, the road was more or less smoothed out, but did cause some potholes where the pavement cracked due to the heaving.