Pothole problems: Vallejo ranks as having the worst roads in the Bay Area, again

VALLEJO, Calif. (KGO) -- The Bay Area's bumpiest ride is once again in Vallejo.

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission's annual pavement report has found that Vallejo has the worst roads. It's the fifth year in a row that Vallejo has been in the bottom five.

For Vallejo resident David Marsteller Jr., the city's abysmal rating for its roads is no surprise.

"To describe the potholes, it's bad. You could hit them and they'll give you a concussion," he said.

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Marsteller says it's been that way for as long as he can remember.

And it's a story ABC7 News has been covering for years.

We first met Marsteller back in 2022 when he and a group of friends formed the Vallejo Pothole Vigilantes - a group of locals who went out and filled potholes on their own.

"A lot of the residents were getting tired of it and were like why don't we just take matters into our own side. And we ran a GoFundMe and the next thing you know we had all this money in our GoFundMe so we went out about twice a week," Matsteller said.

The city ultimately shut the Pothole Vigilantes down, a point of frustration for many residents who feel like Vallejo has consistently failed improve the city's roadways.

One of those people is Paula Conley.

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"We constantly pay more for things that say they're going to fix it. Then it doesn't get fixed. That money goes somewhere else and we're in the same boat," Conley said.

Marsteller believes the blame falls not just on the city but also on state and federal officials.

He says in order to truly fix the problem, it's going to take a lot more than just filling potholes.

"Fixing the potholes is just a band-aid. We have to tear up the streets, re-pipe the city and then build back over it and that, that's a lot of money," he said.

While Vallejo was ranked as having the worst roads in the Bay Area, the Marin County city of Larkspur is rated the best.