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Robust Pothole Plan Rolled Out Across Herefordshire £1.25m additional funding will help to tackle the issue Balfour Beatty Living Places has scaled up their approach to combat the county’s potholes through the delivery of a proactive pothole repair plan. Herefordshire Council’s public realm contractor recorded over five times the number of potholes in March 2018 compared with the previous year, mainly due to the combination of water on the network and extremely cold temperatures caused by the prolonged winter weather. The challenge of tackling the increased number of potholes across the UK has been acknowledged by government, and Herefordshire Council recently secured £1.25m of additional funding to help tackle the issue. This is in addition to the £5m successful funding bid to the Department for Transport’s Local Highways Maintenance Challenge Fund, which will see the second phase of road improvement work on the A4103 and A438 begin in August 2018. Balfour Beatty Living Places’ pothole repair teams have been working hard to overcome the high number of road defects and, since January 2018, have repaired over 13,700 defects, compared to around 3,000 this time last year. The pothole repair plan sees more operational pothole gangs out on the network, and the use of a ‘jetpatcher’ machine enables higher volumes of potholes to be repaired quickly and effectively. Andy Williams, Balfour Beatty Living Places Contract Director, said: Councillor Barry Durkin, Herefordshire Council Cabinet Member for Transport and Regulatory Services, said:

Herefordshire roads badly affected by the recent severe weather will benefit from an additional £1.25m of central government funding for repairs. This funding, which totals £1,252,647, will be used to repair more roads, addressing the equivalent of 23,000 potholes and build in protection to help make the county’s roads more resistant to future severe weather. Councillor Barry Durkin, Herefordshire Council Cabinet Member for Transport and Regulatory Services, said:

This is a letter that I have sent to to our councillor today in the hope that I receive a response. I am sure that is also an issue in other areas, but when you are not even trying to join the que and waiting excessively, something needs to be done. As for the road surface saga - well its just a joke considering it’s a “new†development! I’ve driven on smoother farm tracks. I am writing to you in the hope that you may be able to help resolve some issues we are having on Woodward Avenue (formally Broxash Drive) Every weekday morning we have problems with traffic using the street as a rat run on to Belmont Road which is causing queues of traffic on our street and problems for residents not being able to manoeuvre vehicles on or off driveways. This morning the traffic was particularly bad on the street and vehicles were queuing up as far as the top of the road next to the children's playground and blocking every driveway. I came out of the house this morning with my 5 year old to take her to school in Madley and despite all the traffic seeing me getting in my car, not one car left me any room for me to pull off my driveway. When the traffic started moving I slowly started to pull of my driveway only for another car to then pull forward, blocking me again, and refusing to move for me to be able to come off my drive, despite me telling them I wanted to go in the opposite direction to them. When I was eventually given space to reverse off the drive I was unable to see down the road to see if anything was coming the other way as the vehicles were obscuring my view, I was lucky that there wasn't a car coming as there would have been no way I would have seen them, or them see me. There are also problems with drivers speeding down the road, especially towards the earlier part of the morning before the majority of the traffic builds up on the street. The road itself is an utter mess with major potholes all along the street and the extra traffic using the road is only going to make things worse, we have been told by the highways agency that despite this area being classed as a new development, there are no funds available to resurface this road. Unfortunately I think at some point in the future if these issues are not addressed there will be an accident on the street, whether due to speeding vehicles, poor condition of the road, or queuing traffic obscuring residents view/access off or on driveways.

Noticed this weekend (just gone) that there's a large pothole, inbound, on the Barrs Court side of the metal bridge. Went over yesterday (Monday) and it's got 50% bigger and deeper in a couple of days ... So be careful if you are using that bit of road! If you hit it full on there's a potential to do some damage!

I visited BB drop-in session last week and again reported Stanberrow Rd. and Belmont Rd. regarding craters, these had been reported to. Amey and BB when they took over in September. I have just received a response as follows: This request is currently awaiting inspection, sorry Colin.

If you thought Herefords potholes are bad, have a look at pothole britain-drivers beware on ch5+1 now