A Virginia man successfully pressured local officials to fill in a large pothole after more than a year by planting a tree in the hole -- twice.

ADVERTISEMENT
Josh Anderson of Hopewell said he and his neighbors were becoming increasingly frustrated with the city's failure to address a gaping pothole at the intersection of South 19th Avenue and Richmond Street.

"It was about a foot deep. It was maybe about that deep. If you hit it at a good speed, it would mess your car up," Anderson told WTVR-TV.

Anderson decided to draw the city's attention to the hole by planting a small tree in the pothole. Video of the spectacle quickly went viral on TikTok.

The tree was swiftly removed by city workers, but the hole remained.

"I come back home from work and the tree was gone. So I pulled up another tree and I planted it, put some lights on it," Anderson said.

Anderson said a crew came to the intersection the next day to fill the pothole in properly.

"As many times as I went to ask to get it done and nothing's been done about it. And as soon as I make a Tik Tok and put it on their web page with a tree in it, within 24 hours, they had a crew out here fixing it," Anderson said.