Waara Discusses Pot Holes, Houghton’s Safe City Ranking

With the spring thaw comes those all-too-familiar pot holes in local roads. Dodging craters will only become more difficult as new holes form as the ground unfreezes and the concrete buckles.

Houghton City Manager Eric Waara said crews are working to keep up with the pot holes, but the fixes can only be temporary until the weather warms and they can switch from cold to hot patch.

“Everything is still wet, it’s still cold, and those are not good conditions to try and actually apply hot patch because it won’t stick.  So, we’ll get them temporarily repaired and then when the weather is better, we’ll be able to get hot mix in them,” said Waara.

A bit of good news was shared by Waara at the city council’s regular meeting Wednesday—the city of Houghton has been named the 3^rd safest city in Michigan by https://www.safehome.org/safest-cities/.

Houghton was the highest ranked city in the Upper Peninsula.

Waara said safety is one of the main things people want when looking for a place to live. “When people are researching places to move to locate a business, it’s certainly something for us to be proud of and be able to use as part of our marketing tool,” he said.

One other note—even though warmer weather has arrived, Waara said the city’s Let Run notice is still in effect.