Hillsdale County Road Commission crew members are at it this week, filling in potholes that have dried out from last week’s heavy rains.
Several roadways became impassable, as rainfall and snowmelt flooded streets and some basements, according to City Police Chief Scott Hephner. Now three patch crews are working to fill the spots that the water’s freezing and thawing have left behind.
“They’ve had crews out,” Hephner said. “They were waiting until the roads dried up a little bit, because the holes were full of water. I think they’ve had better luck filling them this week.”
Fortunately, there were no vehicles accidents as a result of water on the roads, Hephner said.
Fisher Road in Branch County, which turns into Bankers Road in Hillsdale County, faced the brunt of the changing weather, as heavy rains took out a culvert and left nothing underneath the asphalt, which collapsed. The closed off section reopened on Tuesday, according to The Daily Reporter in Coldwater.
Hillsdale College students traveling into Branch County said they had to find new ways to avoid the washout.
“It gave you a chance to see some new scenery, which is always good,” said junior Tess Patton, who attends Pine Ridge Bible Church in Quincy, Michigan.
Patton said her return to campus on Sunday was challenged after stopping at a friend’s home after church.
“We thought since we weren’t coming straight from Pine Ridge that we wouldn’t have to worry about the closure, but we went to turn onto this on road, and it was closed,” Patton said. “We ended up going on this long exhibition down this horrible dirt road.”
In the City of Hillsdale, flooding shut down West Hallett Road at the railroad viaduct for several days. The city also closed Division Street between Summit Street and Hillsdale Street for three days.
Cassandra Champion, a House of Pizza and BBQ employee, said Division Street has been flooding like since as long she can remember.
“I grew up here and that road is always flooded,” she said. “People have just learned to get around it.”
Champion added that even though the flooding was an inconvenience to people getting in and out of the parking lot, it did not seem to inhibit business.
“We actually had more business during the flash flood than we were having before — maybe people just couldn’t get around us,” she said.
Steve Blossom, a Division Street resident said although he finds the flooding difficult, he’s learned to get around the water.
“We just deal with it. This happens all the time,” he said. “You just have to learn how to get around these things.”
