Shropshire to get extra £2.2 million to tackle potholes

Telford & Wrekin Council will get an extra £348,000 to spend on repairing the roads as part of a £100 million boost from central government.

Shropshire Council will get an extra £1.86 million to deal with the damage caused by the cold weather and storms, Transport Secretary Chris Grayling announced today.

Mr Grayling said the money would help repair almost two million potholes as well as help protect the roads from any future severe weather.

This is on top of the £75 million in government funding already given to councils from the Pothole Action Fund this year, as well as the additional £46 million boost for highways authorities announced just before Christmas.

Around seven million potholes will be filled due to this money, announced in the 2016 Budget.

Mr Grayling said: “We have seen an unusually prolonged spell of freezing weather which has caused damage to our local roads.

“We are giving councils even more funding to help repair their roads all road users can enjoy their journeys without having to dodge potholes."

The Government is also investing more than £900,000 in innovations using connected vehicles to help councils more efficiently manage and plan maintenance works.

The aim of these trials is to provide councils with data to enable them to repair potholes before they occur as well as maintain their other assets more effectively as part of their asset management plans. This will help prevent further potholes and other road defects occurring over time.

The Asphalt Industry Alliance's annual report identified more than 24,000 miles of local roads across the country asneeding essential maintenance within the next year – almost the whole way around the world.

English and Welsh local authorities are reporting a shortfall in funding totalling nearly £556 million a year – equivalent to £3.3 million per authority.

It said local authorities needed more than £9.3 billion to bring the network up to scratch.

Backlog

The report said even if the funding was available, it would take 14 years to catch up with the backlog.

Over the past 10 years 17.9 million potholes have been filled at a cost exceeding £1 billion. In the last year, 1.5 million were filled – one every 21 seconds.

This afternoon Telford MP Lucy Allan welcomed today’s announcement.

“Recent bad weather has caused damage to many roads in and around Telford so I’m pleased the Department for Transport has responded positively to support requests, and will be making over £347,000 available in Telford to undertake necessary repairs to our road network,” she said.

Last week Telford-based MEP Jill Seymour called for an urgent injection of cash to deal with the problem.

The Ukip transport spokesman said one in five roads maintained by local authorities in Great Britain were now officially described as being in poor condition, or had been flagged up for further inspection.

“This is simply unacceptable at a time when there are record-breaking numbers of vehicles on our roads – paying taxes to the exchequer," she said.

“The winter’s cold snap has merely emphasised the appalling condition of our rapidly

crumbling road network, which in many cases is posing a serious risk to people’s safety

“Compensation claims are on the increase from road users who feel the full force of these cavernous potholes – so a failure to invest in proper, long-standing repairs is false economy."