Damage caused by plates expensive for some

By Gina Vasselli
Edited by Jennifer Silverman
Date posted: March 4, 2009

Smack in the middle of many Columbia streets are 6- by- 10 foot, half-inch to inch-thick, 3,500-pound steel plates.

They are there to keep traffic moving during construction, but if you hit one the wrong way, your car could come to an abrupt and expensive stop.

Frank Floyd, the manager of the a Midas auto service center on Millwood Avenue, said a woman came in to his shop recently to get an estimate on her car that had been damaged by one of the plates.

"There was actually a gash in the tire where it just took a hunk of rubber right out of it," Floyd said.

He said it would cost $600 to replace both of her passenger side tires and rims.

Brian Motley, a state Transportation Department engineer, said the department receives complaints about the plates damaging cars, but not regularly. Most are about the noise, he said.

"We get a lot of complaints if they're in front of residences," he said. "The cars go over them and they bang."

He said if a plate is warped, or if the road is curved so the plate does not lie flat, it  can pop a tire or damage a rim, in addition to the noise.  Even at a ton and a half, the plates also can slide, uncovering the holes they are meant to cover, he said.

"A big truck hits them and slams on the brakes and they're going to move it," he said.

The Transportation Department says the plates must  be used on holes deeper than 2 inches and must be anchored with asphalt around the edges or by pinning the plate to the road.  But Motley said contractors don't always anchor them.

Making sure the plates are anchored falls on whichever department, or city is in charge of the project or repair. So does the responsibility for any damage.

Bill Vandiver, a manager at Complete Car Care on Gervais Street, said a plate can cause a lot of damage if it is no longer covering the hole.  How much depends on the car's speed and the hole's depth.

Floyd said the suspension and alignment are the most likely parts to be damaged by driving into a hole, a much more expensive fix than damaging the tires or rims.

"You could easily get into a $1,000 to $2,000 repair," Floyd said.

There are more plates on Columbia's streets than usual because the city is rehabilitating water lines, sewer lines and storm drains, said Dana Higgins assistant city engineer for construction.

In addition to covering a hole, Higgins said, the plates are used at the end of a project to make sure the concrete-like substance used to fill the hole has at least 48 hours to harden before finishing the job with asphalt.

There are no restrictions on how long the plates can be in the road, Motley said.

Floyd thinks signs would help people slow down, but nothing says signs have to warn you a plate is ahead.

"You run 45 mph and you see something like that happening, you don't have enough time to stop," he said.

The Transportation Department follows the guidelines laid out in a national manual on traffic signs, maintenance director Jim Feda said.  Even if a city had an ordinance requiring signs, it would not apply to state workers, department spokesman Stan Shealy said.

"Because the situations are always different, the sign could be more distracting that anything else," Shealy said.

Motley said the plates aren't perfect, but, they do allow traffic to keep flowing.  With all the projects the city has going, he says, you will probably see them around for another year and a half.