that's iceland. they don't have potholes, because none of their streets get very old, see exhibit A

A bunch of my co-workers are situated in Iceland and, you joke, but they have had to leave the office twice because of risk of lava in about a year.

Which seems like a startlingly high number

In Iceland it's a commonly accepted reason to stay home. Volcano-leave, we call it.

Bro that's the new Iceland, anything underneath has been Pompeii'd

They did that in Hawaii decades ago when Kīlauea covered Chain of Craters road and others.

Kīlauea said “Fuck that” and covered the roads again and again, along with entire neighborhoods. The Hawaiians just let it all go back to nature now. You can drive roughly 10 miles of Chain of Craters Road now, which is in Volcanoes National Park, until it ends very much like the road in this picture.

Speaking of Kīlauea, you might be interested in reading about Jacks Lava House which survived for years as the entire neighborhood around it was reclaimed by the volcano. It was eventually reclaimed by Kīlauea as well about a decade ago.

Just paint a yellow line and call it a day.

On that note of a million questions, the soil looks pretty soily; How long would it take that new lava rock to become as soily on top?

You clearly don't know people

Imagine this would happen in the US! The police would have shot the lava!

EDIT: For the Downvoters: Of course they would have shot the lava. Have you seen it? Its black!

I visited Iceland, not too long ago. The tour guides, politely, made a point of illustrating how much of a rude menace tourists can be with their rental cars. We got a pass, of course, as we were on a tour bus every time this happened. The message was clear: use the world-class public transit and charter busses/tours where possible.

My perspective as a tourist: the cops really are needed in situations like this.

Jeep Owners have entered the chat

"I don't understand why turnover is so high. Ever since COVID people just don't have any work ethic. The lockdowns really destroyed our economy in irreparable ways. Wait no, don't quit."

I'm not the kind of person you wanted a response from since I know absolutely nothing, but I would imagine being an island, boats play a big role in keeping supply lines running.

I’ve been there on tour once, and I just looked at an online map to make sure I didn’t misremember. I also follow a guy on YouTube that talks about geology and has been focused on Iceland lately, so I think that makes me a complete expert.

Joking aside, the road to Grindavik is sort of out of the way, but it is the connector road between the south coast and the airport, so it’s like a 45 minute diversion to get to the airport from the south coast (and vice versa). And like an hour+ diversion if you’re going from the south coast to the Blue Lagoon/the geothermal power/hot water plant that provides power and heat to the airport and (I think) most of Reykjavik.
Unfortunately the power plant/Blue Lagoon is very close to the fissure, and it’s possible a future larger lava flow could damage them. (It is expected more fissures/flows will occur, but the location and size are unknown.) I’m sure both the civil engineering and tourism folks are working on spinning up alternative sites.

Grindavik, for what it’s worth, keeps bouncing between being evacuated and residents griping so much they get let back in. The Icelandic government has an offer on the table to purchase people’s homes in the town, so they move out. I think the plan is probably to abandon the town, since it’s possible this eruptive period could last hundreds of years. (Or not! We have no idea, really, just past data and informed guesses.)

Obsidian forms when lava cools very rapidly, limiting crystal growth. The lava pictured above most likely cooled slowly.

We haven't created real life catgirls yet

It happens. Times past they’ve used buckets of seawater to save villages from encroaching lava. Icelanders are built different.