Telford ‘among worst places in UK for potholes’
Thursday 20th January 2011, 11:05AM GMT.
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Telford was today named as being one of the worst places in the country for roads scarred with potholes following a survey which was carried out by the AA.
Nearly 2,000 members of AA took part in a survey on the state of roads and pavements in their areas and Telford is in the top three for the worst potholes.
Kilmarnock in Scotland and the Fylde coast of Lancashire are the other two pinpointed as having the worst problems.
But Councillor Adrian Lawrence, cabinet member for environment at Telford & Wrekin Council, today hit out at the survey results.
He claimed conclusions were based on research in only seven postcode areas – three of which were not even in Telford & Wrekin.
Earlier this week the council sent out extra teams of pothole-busters after calls from members of the public.
AA president Edmund King said: “Neglect of these areas has a significant impact on how people feel about where they live.
Those taking part in the survey recorded the number of potholes within two miles of their homes.
But Councillor Lawrence said: “We are disappointed that the AA appears to have based their conclusion on research carried out in only seven postcode areas, three of which are not in Telford and Wrekin.
“We are continuing to deal with the legacy of under-investment in our highways infrastructure that we inherited when we took control of the council.
“Last year we invested a record amount in our highways and that included a pothole-busting campaign which repaired approximately 11,500 potholes.”
“We will be running this campaign again in the near future.
Report potholes on (01952) 384000 or visit www.telford.gov.uk
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I travel around the UK and see plenty of potholes. Telford doesn’t appear to be any worse than anywhere else in my experience… slightly better, in fact, if anything.
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Why complain about a few measly potholes, they don’t hurt anyone….well not unless you hit one on your bike or in your car and veer into the path of someone else, that is, or consider new suspension every year to be a downer.
On the upside, we have some of the best traffic lights, speed limits signs and traffic restrictions that I’ve ever known in this area…keep spending millions on traffic lights, motorist taming etc and forget the potholes…they aint sexy!
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I was commenting to a friend the other day, on how well I thought Telfords roads were maintained compared to other areas. In fact in general the roads are excellent in my opinion.
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I dont think the roads in general are that bad round Telford compared to anywhere in Shropshire County area… and are better than the west midlands.
Although i do think the highways dept. have been a little slow to react to potholes this year compared to the freezing temperatures early last year.
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Totally agree with the survey, Our road is particularly bad especially in the areas of traffic calming where both sets of traffic use the same part of the road. The problem here is the patch teams who do a “part job” instead of relaying an entire stretch of road. One such area I have regularly caused damage to my car on has left a pot hole 3 times in the past year! I get the impression that the teams think that by just doing a part job means they will keep themselves in a job as they have to keep returning to the same places!
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I think the general consensus seems to be that residents aren’t surprised by the results of this survey.
Astonishingly our local council doesn’t “normally keep records of the number of potholes repaired”. (See http://tinyurl.com/5udvbgm for full FOI request around potholes in Telford)
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