Road repair material

Further to the letter by Francis Borg (June 4) on proprietary products for road maintenance, I would like to mention that the repair done in the pictures was a test to establish the ease of use, performance in an adverse road defect and the speed at which the repair could be conducted.

It took five minutes to repair a previously failed road surface and the repair has held out for more than a year with no signs of further failure. Nothing else can do this so Viafix is a perfect solution in these situations. I was not ranting about the product, it was just a suggestion that a new material on the market is available, which will make a difference in the quality of the repairs.

The “bad practice” repair carried out with Viafix is still in place, is a good running surface, seals the binder course and gives good skid resistance. It shows no sign of failure, even at the feathered edges.

Mr Borg is correct to say that the method of repair is “bad practice” but one must understand what Viafix can do even in this circumstance. If it had been done like this with any other material it would have failed in days which is what happens in Malta.

The major bad practice here in Malta is that the “highway teams” involved in road maintenance and emergency repairs just do not look beyond the tip of their noses. They are happy to use “sub-standard materials” and repeat repair works already done, losing man hours and costing them more in the long run, not to mention public perception of poor workmanship.

I would say that the trap was snapped shut a long time ago by using mediocre and sub-standard materials for such repairs.