Asphalt Patching in Harlingen, TX

Asphalt patching repairs the parts of a driveway or lot that have failed: potholes, sunken areas, broken edges and trenches left after plumbing or utility work. The City of Harlingen's own Paving Division spends much of its time on exactly this kind of work, patching potholes and repairing street cuts across about 323 miles of streets. On private pavement, the cause is the same: water gets through a crack, softens the base, and traffic breaks the surface.

Why throw-and-go patches fail

Cold patch dropped into a hole and tamped with a shovel fills the gap for a few weeks. It does not fix the wet base underneath and does not compact enough to bond, so it pushes out under traffic. A real patch removes the broken asphalt to solid edges, digs out wet or soft base, rebuilds it with compacted stone, and fills the area with hot-mix asphalt rolled tight. On Harlingen clay, that base step is the difference between a repair that lasts years and one that fails by next September.

Types of repair

• Hot-mix patches for potholes and small failed areas
• Saw-cut, full-depth patches for larger failures, with clean square edges
• Edge rebuilds where pavement is breaking into the lawn or a ditch
• Trench restoration after plumbing, gas or electric work
• Infrared repairs, where the surrounding asphalt is heated and reworked, for some surface defects

Fix the water too

If a pothole keeps coming back in the same place, water is getting to it. We look for the source: a low spot, a downspout, an irrigation head, or a crack upslope. Fixing that is part of the repair.

When to stop patching

Patches covering a big part of the surface, or new failures appearing next to old ones, mean the base has broadly failed. Continuing to patch costs more over time than an overlay or rebuild. We will show you the numbers both ways.

Commercial lots

On business lots, potholes are a trip and liability concern. We prioritize walkways and drive lanes, work in off-hours, and reopen repaired areas quickly.

Planning repairs over time

If a full overlay is not in this year's budget, we can rank the repairs: walkways and drive lanes first, then the spots where water is getting into the base, then the cosmetic areas. You get a written plan, so the most important work is done first and the rest can follow.