Before the patch: Looking west on Third between Main and Madison on July 21, 2025.
The pavement on Southeast Third Avenue between Main and Madison streets was one of the worst in that section of Albany, and the subject of occasional complaints.
This week the Albany city street crew did something to help: The eastbound driving lane on the block got a two- or three-inch patch of smooth asphalt on Thursday. Presumably the westbound driving lane in the block is getting the same treatment today.
As I’ve reported before, the street crew has been using the city’s new paver to make some of the worst sections of streets drivable even though full-scale repairs are put off until the city can figure out how to pay for them.
In July 2023, the city council approved the purchase of a paving machine. It’s a “2024 LeeBoy 7000-C Asphalt Paver” and cost $160,479. The machine was delivered in January 2024.,
This February, for a story on a similar pavement repair near the corner of Pine Street and Seventh Avenue, Robb Romeo, transportation manager in Albany Public Works, told me the crew used the new machine to pave about 10 sections of streets in 2024 and hoped to do the same this summer.
Third, Fourth and Fifth avenues, in the old section of Albany east of Lyon Street, have long been notorious for potholes and broken asphalt. Romeo told me those streets were on his list, and the worst sections would most likely be addressed this summer.
Now that one block of Third is being improved, the main question is: Which one is next? (hh)
One lane of Third Avenue between Main and Madison was ready for traffic on Thursday afternoon.
Have you ever driven on SE 6th Ave, the one they closed when they build the new fire station downtown? You want to talk about pot holes…
6th street is not safe for a horse
Why in the h___!!!! Are they paving over a super bad road, how do they fill gaps, this is very bad, unbelievable they would spend money overlaying garbage. But like usual people in power make the best decisions for our citizens, do it right
From what I could see, they ground down the old asphalt first. On the unfinished lane I saw, the bumps were gone.
Would love to see my former county road, now city street, improved. Fulton between 25 and 27, it’s very rough and crumbling.
$18 million rolled over into the ’23-’25 Streets budgets, the city wants to add a gas tax to cover the $9-11 million it’s going to take to fix our roads. This is the best they can do? With a biennial budget of $400 million it seems they can’t get enough of our money.