The US has about 6.5 million kilometres of road where potholes can form, and almost all of it has been imaged by Google satellites and Street View cars. To utilise this resource, researchers at the University of Maryland, College Park developed a software that allows volunteers with virtually no training to scan through the streets in a neighbourhood, marking potholes as they go. The study crowd sourced from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk service, and used a simple training video to orient participants.
The program can turn the pothole data into detailed, highlighted maps so road crews know where to go. The Department of Transportation has expressed interest in the research, and future versions may not rely on volunteers at all, if computer algorithms can be used to “see” potholes with even more accuracy. Here’s the road to widespread integration is a well-paved one. [New Scientist]
Image credit: Shutterstock/wawritto
Do you really need Google StreetView, or do you just need a simple iphone/android app to register pothole locations, because at the moment the only way to do it is to call the council and be bounced around 3 or 4 people before lodging your pothole, details of which are scribbled on a post-it and chucked in the bin by cleaning staff later that night.
StreetView is an integral part of the day to day operation in most local governments, whether it is being used to locate assets (drains, signs, traffic islands etc.) or for desktop analysis of the surrounding environment.
As for trying to identify potholes along roads, it will be very hit and miss. Google only do a pass of a road at a certain point in time, most likely be during the better more sunny weather periods in which the amount of potholes forming in roads is at it lowest!
Potholes form very quickly from the road deteriorating i.e. minor cracking or crocodile cracking forming and then ultimately a pothole if it is not attended to in a timely manner. Potholes also form during the wetter periods of the year with the extra moisture finding a way through the asphalt/spray seal wearing course and into the sub base (crushed rock) which is then washed away thus forming a pothole.
As for algorithms, they have already been developed and many councils in across Australia undertake cyclical condition surveys of their roads to determine the best time to intervene and stop the road from forming potholes. This said there are still potholes that will form and will continue to perform into the future.
Finally, if you wish to report a pothole to council, call up and state clearly that you wish to report a "Pothole". No matter who answers your call they will be able to record the information they require or put you through to the area to record this information. Council will have a system to record these details and workflows in place to have these works fixed in a timely manner, as most Councils understand that it is quite critical to the roads performance to have it fixed sooner rather than later as it costs in the order of 4-8 times to renew/rehabilitate a road rather than place another wearing course over the top to increase the life of the road.
If potholes only occurred once every two years, then Google Street View would be a great solution.
However...
Too bad Street View here isn't updated as frequently as in North America.
Sutherland Shire Council does a good job at crowd sourced defect reporting.
Its available on there website and via there app.
http://www.sutherlandshire.nsw.gov.au/General/Report_It?reqType=Potholes
http://www.sutherlandshire.nsw.gov.au/General/Report_It/Report_It_App