Britain's Broken Roads

[Clunkclick]

I've just been watching a programme by that title on BBC1. Some real horror stories on injury to people and damage to vehilcles caused by total lack of/late maintenance and poor repair standards.

They say that the motoring tax take is £48billion per annum and that only a tenth of that goes back into the roads. In some counties the resurfacing "Programme" means unclassified roads are due to be re-surfaced once every 240 years !!! In the Merseyside area 100% of road repairs by utilities were failing the county surveyor standards.

Disgraceful

Wonder what the repair cycle in France, Germany or even Greece is ?

I say sequester funds off of the miserable b*st*rd banks i.e. the money they are refusing to lend to businesses and repair the roads and maintain the school building programme. etc.

Nick

Edited 8 July, 2010 by Clunkclick

[Rapide130]

I've just been watching a programme by that title on BBC1. Some real horror stories on injury to people and damage to vehilcles caused by total lack of/late maintenance and poor repair standards.

They say that the motoring tax take is £48billion per annum and that only a tenth of that goes back into the roads. In some counties the resurfacing "Programme" means unclassified roads are due to be re-surfaced once every 240 years !!! In the Merseyside area 100% of road repairs by utilities were failing the county surveyor standards.

Disgraceful

Wonder what the repair cycle in France, Germany or even Greece is ?

I say sequester funds off of the miserable b*st*rd banks i.e. the money they are refusing to lend to businesses and repair the roads and maintain the school building programme. etc.

Nick

Can't comment on Germany or Greece, but France appear to repair their roads depending on the region. In Normandy the roads are almost perfect and any damage seems to be repaired very quickly. As you go east there appears to be less money available and by the time you get over the border into Belgium the surface makes our roads seem wonderful (might need my tracking done after a recent holiday!).

We can help the councils and Highways Authorities by reporting every pothole and not leaving the problem to others. Get onto your local county council websites or to www.highways .gov.uk (for trunk roads and motorways) and tell them where the holes are.

Simon

[simonsheil]

Well the money has to come from somewhere, however, as someone pointed out to me the other day if we took Roman Abromivich forturne it would pay for the NHS for the incredible period of 1 week.

I peronally think the drive on the NHS has been madness, in thirteen years spending had trippled, eseentially prolonging more lives to use the other services which have been drained of cash to pay for the NHS expansion.

It all stems to priorities for spending, we can't have everything so what do we want?

I personally am far too inhuman so see little point in spending tens of thousands of pounds on drugs to prolong life by 6 months, or thousands keeping alive old perople that just want to die. I also disagree with GPs earning 100k a year but maybe thats just me.

Simple fact if you want good infrastructure something has to give, either road charging or other services.

[RADIOTWO]

I've just been watching a programme by that title on BBC1. Some real horror stories on injury to people and damage to vehilcles caused by total lack of/late maintenance and poor repair standards.

They say that the motoring tax take is £48billion per annum and that only a tenth of that goes back into the roads. In some counties the resurfacing "Programme" means unclassified roads are due to be re-surfaced once every 240 years !!! In the Merseyside area 100% of road repairs by utilities were failing the county surveyor standards.

Disgraceful

Wonder what the repair cycle in France, Germany or even Greece is ?

I say sequester funds off of the miserable b*st*rd banks i.e. the money they are refusing to lend to businesses and repair the roads and maintain the school building programme. etc.

Nick

So why don't we do something about it ?

£48billion is a lot of dosh that should regardless of what they tell us

lets start by contacting the local MP

then every time a wheel or tyre is damaged take pictures and claim off the local council (if you can get £7000 from a inquiry claim)

I am sure some solisotor will take up the claim for the damage to cars.

I don't know off the top of my head how many members there are on here, but if we all contacted your MP that is a few thousand people !

Radiotwo

[wilsonian]

Well I know the roads around me are nasty - in Feb I hit a pot hole at only 20mph ish and it blew out my tire, knocked out my tracking and took a chunk out the alloy. After contacting manchester council they've finally paid my costs for the trouble.

What annoyed me was the hole I hit re-opened after a month and took another month (and prob more unlucky drivers) to finally get repaired correctly.

It's a joke!

[philc]

I agree with the whole lot -most authorities don't have a "repair cycle" -they just fix 'em when they can't put it off any more. Most experts think that they'd save money if they had a rolling repair cycle.

As to French roads, the major ones are looked after, but why do you think French cars have soft suspension? Country roads are abysmal!

Phil

[Rhoobarb]

In the Merseyside area 100% of road repairs by utilities were failing the county surveyor standards.

I can vouch for that statement, ive got 2 badly scuffed zeniths because of the potholes that werent dealt with quick enough over the winter freeze and were bodged twice before they spent proper money to repair them.

[cheezemonkhai]

I'd say make the utility companies repair the roads again and again at their own expense if their repairs fail during the expected like of the road surface.

[WW_VRS]

The main streets in Bogota are usually fairly good (government covers those), side roads are shockingly bad (as they are meant to be fixed up by the residents pulling together the funding). But the situation in the UK is insane, as a LOT of money is being taxed out of motorists and then used elsewhere. There are good roads too, but definitely it is extremely variable in quality even on motorways.

Add to this that fixing the road happens too late in GB, meaning you can claim back the damage it DOES do to your car if you rip your car to **** when hitting one of those barsteward sharp-edged holes..

How about the concept they have in Holland - road tax is for road repairs, maintenance, investment in motoring-related infrastructure.

[blueR36]

Around here they spray tar and "pebble dash" the roads, stone chips ahoy, I think the councilors must have a repair shop! They always do it in this heat so it never setts! As it is some roads round here have sand on them because the roads are melting :S

[VWD]

We can help the councils and Highways Authorities by reporting every pothole and not leaving the problem to others. Get onto your local county council websites or to www.highways .gov.uk (for trunk roads and motorways) and tell them where the holes are.

Simon

Most Counties have a defect reporting on line service now .

And ,if you've got a decent County Councillor ,and it gets to reporting again after a fortnight ( I did ,saw no markings ,got no thank you reply) ,CC him in on second one .i now get thank you's from them , and holes round here tend to get filled in .

Far amusement sake ,there's a guide on line to size of potholes wrt action that 'll be taken .IT'S BASED ON "DINNER PLATES" - now whether that's a council sized plate or a ratepayer size ,they don't say

[simonhutton1]

Fith gear did a useful feature on potholes. I'm sure it can be youtubed. The council have finally started re-surfacing the road to my estate ehich was covered in creases and potholes which used to do my head in on my 600. However in they're wisdom they've left the entire length of the road covered in what appears to be fine stones. Its been like this for two weeks now and all the stones have ruined my paint and there isn't even any stones left on the road. So know its all dug up, exposed manhole covers and it looks a mess. Did they all decide to go on holiday half way through the job? It makes me want to puke! Especially as we pay rediculous taxes for the pleasure. I for one have already written a letter to my council expressing my feelings and asking for answers. I urge us all to do the same. They're taking the ....

[yashicamat]

4

then every time a wheel or tyre is damaged take pictures and claim off the local council (if you can get £7000 from a inquiry claim) I am sure some solisotor will take up the claim for the damage to cars.

I'm sorry, but with local authorities struggling for budgets already, trying to squeeze claim money out of them isn't going to help matters. Also consider that processing claims will take time from the staff which could otherwise be used for better purposes, not to mention the cost of using that staff time too.

I agree with what some of the others have said; report problems when you see them, but also be tolerant of the fact we've had two of the worst winters for a long time in the last two years, compounded by an ever shrinking amount of money available (which with the new government is surely only going to get even smaller).

Just my 2p worth.

[SnailUK]

As said above, most of the problems i see, are from bodged utilities road building.

Im sure if every single council invested in one permanent roadworks inspector, to go round all the roadworks done by utilities firms, and inspect them for quality, we'd have a lot less issues.

Then start prioritising roadworks over traffic calming measures, and cycle lanes.