In the City of Memphis something that effects me everyday and is a complete pain are the conditions of the roads. This has been something of interest to me since I first arrived in Memphis my freshman year of college. I do not know if there is not money or if something is sucking up the money for roads, but the city needs to find the money necessary to do something about them. I drive everyday across park avenue because I am an RA at Graduate Student and Family Housing on south campus. And everyday I drive I hit more bumps in the road everyday it seems like. The condition of the roads in this city are awful. The thing that gets me about it is that it is not just where I live, it is like this in a lot of places in the city limits. This issue even stretches into downtown and other tourist areas like Graceland and the zoo. Now, I understand that the city is probably not in a rush to fix Park Avenue or Southern, but you would think a city with a good number of tourist would be ready and willing to fix the roads the tourist see. The roads near, and leading up to, Graceland and the roads downtown. I am from Chattanooga and while all of our roads are not the best, the places where we are most tourist heavy have drivable roads. You do not have to worry about hitting a pothole or even a bump in some areas. This probably would not be an issue to me if I was from Memphis because it would be the norm, but everyone I speak to not from here has the same thing to say about the city. Friends that came here from Chattanooga with me always say joking “We are going to have to get new tires before we go home or we will not make it.” This is funny to an extent, but it also has some validity to it.I think that that the mere fact that this is even a joke is an issue. I love the city of Memphis, and I expect to start my career in this city in public office after I get my Masters in Public Administration, and if this issue is not addressed I know it will be one of the first things that I tackle as a public official. In this link, http://www.memphistn.gov/Government/PublicWorks/Maintenance/StreetMaintenance.aspx, it says “All streets receive a periodic evaluation for resurfacing needs. These streets are inspected and assigned a condition and urgency rating. The ratings are then entered into GIS street database. These ratings prioritize the streets and furthermore determine which streets will be added to the Resurfacing Management Plan.”, but they are clearly not checking the streets I drive on. I do not know what the criteria is for a road to be repaved, but they are clearly very strict restrictions because I have not seen a repaved road fully and done well since I have been living in the city. I am not mad that the city has these kinds of road conditions, I am upset because I feel like nothing is being done about these bad conditions.