Debating Suing my Town For New Paintjob
 

So for the most part I try to take very good care of my car. Its my daily, but I avoid driving it in the winter, since I have a beater, Ive never abused it and I installed the splashguards to keep the paint good.

Well theres one country road out of my town thats actually very direct. Any other way is at least another 20 minutes out of the way.

This past winter that main road got beaten on, badly. Lots of potholes, lots of cracks and damage. My town is facing budget crunching so they decided instead of patching or repaving, to dig it up and to put down oil and gravel.

Now as per the town, this is an acceptable finish. Looking at the road, and given the high volume this road has, this is completely unnacceptable by anyone standards. Drove over it once because I didnt know it was there (seemed like it happened overnight) and then the way back and twice more cause I couldnt not take that road to get where I needed to go.

My gills are completely destroyed, theres more silver (metal) then paint there now. Does the town owe me a paintjob since this road destroyed it?

The road is a normal country road, speed limit 45, about 8 miles with no passing lanes and probably does a few thousand cars an hour during peak times. Thoughts, legal advice, help!

I don't think you can sue them, but It does suck. I would just avoid the road from now on.

Yeah, good luck with that.

Though this isnt legal advice, I dont believe you have a case whatsoever. While I agree it is crap that this happened to your car an I agree I would be pissed, by your own admission the the oil/tar is an acceptable finish. Additionally there is another means of travel via another road albeit it is 20 minutes out of your way.

Basically the programming on the radio offends you so you want to sue because of it. Well then change the channel and listen to something else. In this case the road sucks and messed up your paint unfortunately there is another road you can take. :(

Cheers
K

Find a new town

pics of said damage or i'll be skeptical of this claim

and no it is not likely by the end of this story that the town will pay you

Move...sheesh everbody wants something to sue over

I'd sue them for everything they got! Plus $25. It's only fair!!

As far as im concerned, it is NOT an acceptable finish to a road like that. As per the town it is, but obviously the town makes its own rules.

And I don't want to sue over it, but their poor standards are what destroyed the paint on my car. I shouldn't have to drive insanely far out of my way to avoid a major road because the work is unacceptable. They paved every other road on the schedule this year with asphalt, all of which are far more minor then this road.

And I do feel like I have a case because my neighbor nailed them last year for car damage because a pothole was too big. I found out about that the other day, when coincidentally that is the same pothole that destroyed my last cars suspension, ON THE SAME ROAD.

So basically I feel like it is a known problem and the town is neglecting it.

Ill post a picture of my gils when I get home. I can't even stand looking at them anymore their so destroyed.

You say a few thousand cars travel this road in an hour?
Let's under estimate this and say 8,000 cars a day.
Let's say that half the people sued because of damage to their car......that's 4,000 law suits. They're not gonna pay off 4,000 people.
Why should you get your car fixed and the other 3,999 don't?

The reason your car got damaged is because of the design of the car (bows out at the gills) and the road spray comes off the front tires and hits the gills.
My gills look like the've been sandblasted and I've never driven on a dirt road or oiled road, just paved roads. Who am I gonna sue? GM because they designed the car the way they did?

And ill be honest, had I known the major road I need to drive on almost 7 days a week was not going to be maintained, I would have never bought a daily driver I knew I would care about. I would have gotten a POS camry and drove it into the ground.

There's still time!

It's likely that the city is required to fix potholes that are deeper than a few inches because that is a safety hazard. I doubt that analogy will fly very far.

I wouldnt listen to anyone on here telling you that you cant do it. You need to consult a lawyer to see if you have a case, which you may very well have.

Dont listen to all these negative, "you shouldnt have driven there" excuses.