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GREENSBORO — Ker-chunk!!! Sound familiar?

Then you just might be a Greensboro motorist.

And the sound, accentuated perhaps by a thud in your suspension, is proof the city’s facing an uncharacteristic spate of potholes.

Rough spots are breaking out all over on such heavily traveled arteries as Battleground Avenue, South Elm-Eugene and Lee streets, Cone Boulevard, Holden Road, Westover Terrace and others.

Chalk it up, partly, to cold weather.

“Obviously, wintertime is when you are most likely to see them pop out due to the freezing and thawing,” said Mike Mabe, manager of the city’s street maintenance program.

But that’s just half the answer, he said.

Blame the rest on tight budgets in recent years. The city anted-up less money for its annual resurfacing program, which heads off conditions leading to potholes, he said.

“Quite honestly, we’re not able to provide the same level of service as in the past,” Mabe said.

Last year, the city saved money — at least, in the short term — by not carrying out its annual resurfacing contract.

Long term, if you cut corners on repaving worn streets, reality bites you from behind with potholes now and more extensive resurfacing efforts required later, he said.

When streets aren’t kept up, the crushing weight of cars and trucks takes its toll over time. Cracks get widened by rain, ice, sleet and snow.

They become potholes, which ultimately lead to worse damage.

Potholes not only hit you in the seat of the pants, but they can hit your wallet as well.

Repair shops that specialize in tire and frame work are seeing a lot of cars that need realignments, which generally cost in the $70 to $80 range.

It’s hard to specifically blame an increased number of potholes, but they certainly don’t help, said Frank Bollette, service manager at Merchant’s Tire & Auto on Battleground Avenue.

“Most people don’t know what caused it being out of alignment,” said Bollette.

Bumpy streets are a great selling point for his shop’s $150 lifetime alignment, meaning no charge for future alignments, said Dylan Smith, store manager of Firestone Complete Auto Care, also on Battleground.

“A lot of them say that the roads are so rough,” Smith said of customers who choose the lifetime option.

State repair crews aren’t seeing an increased number of potholes on roads outside the city limits, said Brad Wall, maintenance engineer for the state Department of Transportation in Guilford and four neighboring counties.

But the state did some fairly heavy preventive maintenance last year, using sealant and other materials to head off potential problems, Wall said.

Greensboro fields repair crews to fix potholes, usually within one business day after they are reported, Mabe said.

In addition, the city will resume its street repaving program later this year, Mabe said.

The federal stimulus program ponied up about $1.5 million for resurfacing, he said. And Greensboro voters approved $8 million for such preventive maintenance in the 2008 transportation bonds. That should cover several more years of repaving, Mabe said, but the bonds have not been sold yet.

Contact Taft Wireback at 373-7100 or taft.wireback@news-record.com