ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Driving on many New York roads and highways may seem more like an obstacle course at times, recently. 

Warmer weather has not only melted a lot of snow, it’s also exposed a pothole problem that highway superintendents say is worse than in recent years.

Road crews are using a break in winter to patch up as many as they can.

Normally a product of the spring thaw, this year it is the mark of a late winter meltdown. Potholes are seemingly everywhere. 

“Oh man, they destroy everybody’s wheels,” said Thomas Lewis Jr. “Just so many potholes.”

The pothole across the street from Lewis’s home is an expensive one. He drove over it, breaking the tie rod on his Chevy Tahoe. 

“It’s pretty frustrating,” he said. “It gets expensive.”

A stretch of long, cold weather coupled with a few rainy thaws is to blame for crumbling roads, experts say. 

“It's a little bit earlier this year than normal,” said Karen St. Aubin, Rochester’s Bureau of Operations director. “Usually we get into our potholes a little bit later than this.”

With this week’s warmer weather, city road crews have been working every day until dark. It’s like a game of pothole whack-a-mole.

“The more we take care of it and the more we're on top of it, it leaves less places for water to get in and create more problems,” said St. Aubin.

With uncertainty in Washington over federal funding of just about everything, St. Aubin says Rochester is all set for this year’s road repairs. 

“At this point, we have our scheduled funding and we have funding that we get from all different areas,” she said. “So we're very scheduled when we're doing the major work. And then we have what I’ll call a special team out taking care of these smaller jobs.”

Jobs now getting done, with a lot more to go — a sign of the season.

“I hope they fix it all,” said Lewis. “That will be cool. That would help a lot.”