Dangerous pot hole on N.C.R. Dublin

mrbike

I hit this pot hole at speed on Friday evening. It's lethal. There is a tree blocking the street light which made it difficult to see.

http://www.google.com/maps?vpsrc=0&layer=c&cbll=53.356275,-6.291703&panoid=0RRSbjVxb1lPSSQlJHUWEw&cbp=12,123.78,,1,24.95&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Dublin,+County+Fingal,+Ireland&ll=53.356275,-6.291703&spn=0.003336,0.009484&z=17

It ending up lauching my bike into the air. I landed in the middle of the road and ended up with a broken collar bone and a nice dose of road rash. I was *very* lucky there were no cars behind me. Keep an eye out for it...

Does anyone know the best way to get onto the council to get his fixed? A big thanks to Seamus who gave me a lift home with my bike and then to the hospital.

JMJR

http://www.dublincity.ie/RoadsandTraffic/RoadMaintenance/Pages/RoadPathRepair.aspx


Note: To report an emergency road maintenance issue day or night. Call (01) 679 6186 (24 hours a day), e.g. sudden road collapse

steve9859

Is there a compensation scheme for accidents like this? I am not a supporter of the compensation culture that exists today - if you do something stupid, it's your own fault, and too many people try to pull a fast one.

But that is a 100% council screw up - I'm sick of badly built roads and cyclepaths. I predict that by the end of the winter even the newly laid Coyningham road between Parkgate Street and Islandbridge will be full of potholes. If I hit that hole in the OP's picture and did damage to my bike, had hospital bills, and was off work due to injury, I would without question want compensation

kona

Hope your okay! Seems the pothole is already marked for a patch. What bike were ya riding?

JMJR

kona wrote: »

Hope your okay! Seems the pothole is already marked for a patch. What bike were ya riding?

If its the case that it was identified for repair then DCC Roads knew about it so theres (possibly) a case to be made that liability has been established and OP may well have a claim to be compensated for any financial damages. Imho.

edit:
neither the hole nor the spray paint looks recent and the '1' tag has been made twice indicating a second visit to mark it. I'd suspect its been on a list for a while ( while physically getting bigger) and maybe DCC are packaging a list of repairs for competitive tendering out to subcontractor companies. it might be worth asking DCC Roads about that too.

velo.2010

Hope you heal quickly. I have some experience of ending up in the middle of the road myself!

Does seem like you have a case. Be careful not to add some 'VAT' to your claim as you've posted here and I'm sure these forums are monitered to some extent (or info passed on) by the powers that be in Wood Quay!

Sacksian

Sorry to hear that, OP.

I used to cycle up to the Park from Phibsborough to run a few times a week. I've since just decided to run up instead. The cycle lane - particularly the NCR stretch between Upper Grangegorman and Prussia Street - is unusable and that particular pothole - which I've very narrowly avoided a couple of times - is lethal.

monument

yesboyicecream wrote: »

The cycle lane - particularly the NCR stretch between Upper Grangegorman and Prussia Street - is unusable and that particular pothole - which I've very narrowly avoided a couple of times - is lethal.

This section has started to really annoy me, it's now between me and my local Tesco. There's kind of three sections in a row where the cycle lane has been eaten up -- it's one of the worst surfaces in Dublin.

There's also a single deep pot hole on the other side of the road (heading from Prussia Street to Upper Grangegorman) just as the car parking starts. Here on Street View.

Another annoying cycle lane where problems haven't been fixed in ages is on King Street North (runs above Smithfield). I used to use it a lot before moving out of the area more than a year ago and then moving back in. The pot holes -- which look to be caused by holes dug to services -- have gotten worse. Really annoying when you have a bit of weight on the bike from town.

Limestone1

steve9859 wrote: »

Is there a compensation scheme for accidents like this? I am not a supporter of the compensation culture that exists today - if you do something stupid, it's your own fault, and too many people try to pull a fast one.

But that is a 100% council screw up - I'm sick of badly built roads and cyclepaths. I predict that by the end of the winter even the newly laid Coyningham road between Parkgate Street and Islandbridge will be full of potholes. If I hit that hole in the OP's picture and did damage to my bike, had hospital bills, and was off work due to injury, I would without question want compensation

Council are only liable if they had repaired the pothole already and the repair was at fault. The pothole is "normal wear and tear" until a repair is executed so no compensation is payable.

Beasty

Limestone1 wrote: »

Council are only liable if they had repaired the pothole already and the repair was at fault. The pothole is "normal wear and tear" until a repair is executed so no compensation is payable.

Don't think it's that straightforward. If the Council knew it was dangerous and chose not to do something about it (or took an unreasonable time to do something), I think they could be considered negligent. Doing something could be as simple as cordoning off the relevant part of the road. However proving negligence in this kind of case is more difficult than a "faulty repair" situation

There was a bad pothole near wher I live a couple of years ago that caused damage to a large number of motor vehicles, and I believe the Council did pay out compensation in these cases

mrbike

Thanks for your concern guys I saw the Orthopedic doctor yesterday and no surgery is needed. I'll be off the bike for a while, but in the grand scheme of things I suppose I'm pretty lucky.

Kona - I was on my steel frame road bike (charge juicer), down on the drops. According to the Garmin, I was doing 25kp/h. It's one of those potholes that launches your front wheel into the air, and once that happens, there's not much you can do.
Surprisingly there is very little damage to the bike - right shifter is out of place, front tyre punctured and the rear mudguard has a few dents in it. Amazingly the front wheel is still in true. Mavic Ksyrium's are made of strong stuff.

I spoke to the council and they seemed pretty concerned and said they would get it repaired as soon as possible. My main concern is not compensation, but just to get the damn thing fixed.

Be careful out there guys, especially you night time Audaxers

Cuddlesworth

Limestone1 wrote: »

Council are only liable if they had repaired the pothole already and the repair was at fault. The pothole is "normal wear and tear" until a repair is executed so no compensation is payable.

Unless the pothole was reported and they ignored the damage for a unreasonable length of time. It takes a long time for that spray paint to fade like that.