New proposals to fix busiest roads first

Lancashire County Council is proposing to change the way it responds to highway maintenance issues, to ensure that the most serious problems are fixed the quickest.
A report to the councils cabinet recommends prioritising repairs to problems such as potholes, broken drain grates, loose paving, and damaged bollards on the busiest roads and pavements.A report to the councils cabinet recommends prioritising repairs to problems such as potholes, broken drain grates, loose paving, and damaged bollards on the busiest roads and pavements.
A report to the councils cabinet recommends prioritising repairs to problems such as potholes, broken drain grates, loose paving, and damaged bollards on the busiest roads and pavements.

A report to the council’s cabinet recommends prioritising repairs to problems such as potholes, broken drain grates, loose paving, and damaged bollards on the busiest roads and pavements.

The proposed Highway Safety Inspection Policy will be used by the county council’s highway inspectors, who patrol the county’s roads throughout the year to decide how to record defects and assess how urgently they need dealing with.

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Response times will vary according to risk, with the most serious issues made safe or fixed within four hours, and response times for other problems ranging from two days, to 20 days.

The depth at which a pothole will be fixed remains the same as the previous policy introduced in 2015 – 4cm deep on roads, and 2.5cm deep on pavements.

Until now the council has not defined how wide a pothole must be to need repairing, but the new policy recommends adopting measures that highway inspectors already use for practical purposes – with those on roads needing to be at least 15cm across, and those on pavements 10cm wide.

The proposed policy recommends that an extra two working days be added to target response times.

The proposal will be considered at cabinet today (April 12).