Freeway Embankment Erosion...

**old guy** · April-11-13, 09:19 PM

I've got some friends that are going to love seeing that one. That's one hell of a piece of machinery. You'd be everyone's buddy. We have road crews here that could really use something like this.

**Johnnny5** · April-11-13, 09:47 PM

Oakland County already has similar mowers for cutting the sides of rural roads. They're not quite as complex, but I guess the Germans are still the masters of over engineering. It also appears to be doing some serious damage as it's actually rocking the wooden posts as it goes around them.

**old guy** · April-11-13, 09:52 PM

Originally Posted by Johnnny5

Oakland County already has similar mowers for cutting the sides of rural roads. They're not quite as complex, but I guess the Germans are still the masters of over engineering. It also appears to be doing some serious damage as it's actually rocking the wooden posts as it goes around them.

I don't think they're wood. My guess would be they're on some sort of tension system.
It would be great though. People on a city or county crew ask in the morning, what do you want us to do today. Everything. Shouldn't be a problem. See you at lunch.

**Detroitnerd** · April-12-13, 01:14 PM

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but ... aren't the freeways ALWAYS ugly this time of year? I think it has less to do with erosion or machinery so much as the natural cycle: lots of ground in the region looks brown and muddy this time of year. Mother Nature is not an endless flower show. If you could see the first few inches of soil, there's hellzapoppin' down there. Just wait a month. April showers bring May flowers.

Or perhaps we can have MDOT look into some $2.8 billion system to ensure the freeways have lovely greenscaping even in April, even though, technically, your eyes should be on the road ...

**Gistok** · April-12-13, 02:46 PM

Originally Posted by Detroitnerd

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but ... aren't the freeways ALWAYS ugly this time of year? I think it has less to do with erosion or machinery so much as the natural cycle: lots of ground in the region looks brown and muddy this time of year. Mother Nature is not an endless flower show. If you could see the first few inches of soil, there's hellzapoppin' down there. Just wait a month. April showers bring May flowers.

Or perhaps we can have MDOT look into some $2.8 billion system to ensure the freeways have lovely greenscaping even in April, even though, technically, your eyes should be on the road ...

If you haven't noticed it the last few years... I don't know how explaining it will help... But I'll try... if you drive down I-94 after this weeks rains.. you will see large patches of GREEN along the embankments, and then there are those eroded brown areas. Those are the ones I'm speaking of... not to be confused with the high priced [[and slow paced) moving of street lighting from the center median to the side embankment.

MDOT spends millions on shrubbery [[not billions)... and yet they can't even get the simple act of maintaining a LAWN right...

There's many thousands of feet of this "erosion" along the freeways... I'm sort of surprised you haven't noticed it...