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Planned City Street Paving May Not Be Enough

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - You can drive through them or drive around them, but there's no way to get from point A to point B in the City of Pittsburgh and avoid potholes in the streets.

Beginning Tuesday -- with the onset of paving season, relief should be on the way -- only at this point the city budgeted for only 30-miles of streets.

"It's a drop in the bucket," City Councilman Dan Gilman says.

Gilman says years of budget cuts and pinching pennies allowed the streets to fall into an advanced state of disrepair, and that the city needs to start playing catch up.

"We are so far behind our infrastructure is falling apart," Gilman says.

He gets no arguments from Public Works Director Mike Gable, who agrees that paving 30 miles of streets will not get the job done.

"We need to pave 80 to 100 miles and we're trying to make that commitment this year, but we don't have money right now," Gable says.

Currently, there's only $7 million budgeted for paving and that number would need to be tripled for a significant impact on neighborhood streets.

"You need to navigate, you need to watch you, and need not to hit the big potholes," drivers said.

Paving 30 miles of streets just isn't going to do the trick.

The Peduto Administration is going to have to come up with more money to pave more miles this year and years to come.

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