Second time I've seen crumbling tarmac interfere with traffic flow. (First time was at VA on 23L, big chunk went flying when a 737 opened up the taps)
Today was funnier. Loads of arriving and departing airliners held up while a critical portion of taxiway D was deemed unusable.
After a dodgy-looking old wooden board on wheels was towed into place on the offending tarmac, a bloke from an SUV got out and wandered around poking his toes into the surface. Was this a simulation for a 300-ton 747 taxi-ing over the same ground? The chap was burly, but nowhere near a 747-400 MTOM.
In any event, ATC did well in keeping the delayed traffic flowing as best they could. Full credit there for Ground..
But apart from the terrible surfaces over which we have to taxi, metal plates included, why was the "new" tower built where it now is? We sat there at A4 and then A5 pondering the brilliance of the plan which took out a great piece of turf that could have made a suitable opening for a/c to access T1 and T2. Instead the location used created a bottleneck which hardly benefits when the tarmac starts to crumble.
As for the sinkhole in the new Staff East car park at the main coach stop.........well thats another story. Are the contractors at MAN really doing quality surfacing work? Time will tell.