Shropshire councillor shares road managers' emails with thousands of residents over state of potholes
A councillor resorted to drastic measures in order to address the state of the roads in his ward, handing out direct email addresses.
Dave Tremellen, who represents Highley on Shropshire Council, passed on the direct email addresses for numerous highways officials within the authority to his constituents, resulting in a bombardment of messages.
"The clerk and I were getting increasingly frustrated with highways, as they weren't listening or even responding to our concerns," Councillor Tremellen said.
"I told them 'you can either talk to me or the 3,600 residents I represent'."
Councillor Tremellen, who has been campaigning for better roads across the county for years, said his call for action worked and a roads maintenance machine currently operating in the north of the county was due to visit Highley in coming months.
He added: "The roads in Highley are absolutely disgraceful, they truly are.
"People say the roads across the whole county are bad which I do not doubt, but those same people should come down to Highley and see for themselves how honestly terrible they are."
An emergency road closure was due to take place on New Road today to fix potholes, and a schedule of repairs has been planned for July.
Deadline
Councillor Tremellen said it was an act he had "threatened" them with "many times" in the past.
"If they continued to ignore the elected representative – and clerk to the parish council – of over 3,600 people then perhaps they would prefer to try talking to each of those 3,600 people individually," Councillor Tremellen said.
"I gave them a deadline which they ignored which is when I carried out my promise – as it happens, we have had a measure of success."
From July 12 to 14, New Road will be closed again for repairs before Ingram Lane to Eardington is closed from July 15 to 23.
It comes after Councillor Tremellen hesitantly welcomed the new leader of Shropshire Council's pledge to make fixing the county's potholed roads a "priority".
After winning the majority of votes from her fellow Conservatives to head Shropshire Council as the first female leader last week, Councillor Lezley Picton said sorting the county's roads out would be the "number one priority".
Shropshire Council has been contacted for comment.
