Potholes are the cause of one in three accidents. And no one fixes them.

ROAD HOLE MAINTENANCE

One of this site's dreams is to see mayors across Italy working on the first mission of their mandate: fixing potholes . Instead, we have mayors who have become expert event planners, others who have been thinking about nothing but their political careers since day one , and still others who specialize in announcing major projects. Very few actually handle routine maintenance, starting with potholes.

ALSO READ: Rome's road has a record number of potholes (video). There are 38 in 80 meters, one every step.

MAINTENANCE OF ROAD POTHOTS

The result is that we have Swiss cheese-like roads , and not just in urban areas, and one in three accidents is caused by potholes . Not only that, road maintenance continues to decline every year and, on average, only 50 percent of the necessary repairs are carried out . We have thus returned to the spending levels of thirty years ago, when the kilometers of paved roads were much fewer, and the consumption of new asphalt for repairs continues to decline.

Technology is making significant strides. Machines called Pothole Stoppers can perform repairs on-the-fly, without resurfacing the road . But politicians continue to backtrack, convinced that maintenance doesn't bring in votes. Yet it's the first thing citizens care about.

ROADS AND WASTE: STORIES OF ORDINARY MADNESS:

• Noisy and unsafe roads, everything improves with asphalt made from recycled tires
• The dirtier cities and streets are, the more citizens pay for waste.
• Highways are increasingly expensive. And only the usual suspects are doing the work.