Agenda item

5.1

Andy Buck attended the meeting and asked the following questions:

“1. My complaint of 24 March 2023

On 24 March I emailed Streets Ahead, thus:

“On Wednesday 22 March, one of your staff visited Chippinghouse Road. He marked one pothole with yellow paint. He then looked at and walked past several other potholes and left. Yesterday, 23 March, the one pothole he marked was filled, which is of course good - see attached photo.

At least some of the potholes he did not mark are hazardous, in particular to cyclists. See attached photos for three examples.

Why weren’t these other potholes marked for repair? Could this now be done, please.”

This complaint was acknowledged on 28 March 2023. I have since been told on seven occasions that owing to ongoing investigations it has not been possible to respond to my concern. At the Committee on 27 September I was told that “many of the points have been addressed in the Streets Ahead response dated 7 August” and that “the ongoing remaining issues … will be responded to by October 2023”.

My concern was simple: why didn’t the Streets Ahead member of staff mark up the other, hazardous potholes for repair?

Will the Council please ensure that I receive a response to this concern, and tell me by when I will receive this?

2. Shorter term maintenance of Chippinghouse Road

At the Committee on 27 September I asked “will the Council guarantee that Amey will repair all the sections of Chippinghouse Road marked up for repair on 15 September 2023 before the yellow markings fade and disappear.” The answer was unequivocal: “Yes, Amey have confirmed that they will repair all the sections marked up for repair.”

I have appended a page of photographs of the marked up sections of the street.

Three months have passed. The yellow markings are no more. No work has been done.

Will the Council please explain why the commitment made on 27 September has not been fulfilled, what steps you are taking to ensure that Amey does so, and by when the repairs will be completed.

3. Resurfacing of Chippinghouse Road and neighbouring streets

I am pleased to see that Chippinghouse Road is in phase 3 of the CIP design programme.

Will the Council please confirm that:

a) The design process will be completed by 31 March 2024?

b) Amey will definitely complete the required works by 31 March 2025?”

The Chair responded with the following answers:

1. A draft response has been compiled and provided to SCC, which will now be checked for SCC comments and sign off.

A condition survey was undertaken on 18 January 2022 and a routine safety inspection was undertaken on 2 December 2022.

Ad-hoc inspections were also undertaken on 19 January 2023, 22 March 2023, 3 May 2023 and 16 June 2023, following receipt of reports from members of the public.

The inspector carrying out the inspection on 22 March 2023 will have identified defects requiring immediate intervention. Lesser defects would be left to be picked up as part of planned works.

During the condition surveys, issues identified are added to our bespoke software system which creates a condition score. The condition survey undertaken on 18 January 2022, identified overall failures on the section of carriageway from Abbeydale Road to Crescent Road.

Under the Streets Ahead contract the condition scores mean that when the average condition of a given road or section of road falls below these pre-set condition scores, any failures must be addressed.

As the data is run once a year, however, and the condition survey interval is every two years, there is often a delay before roads or sections of roads are eligible for works to be undertaken.

This is often why interim repairs are carried out to ensure that the road remains in a safe condition for all road users.

2. All category 1 defects have now been repaired and follow up works completed.

There have been delays due to this street being part of the outstanding CIP programme and an initial view that any non-urgent works should wait until the CIP programme has been completed however this has rightly been challenged as unacceptable and  Amey will be carrying out an interim treatment to eliminate further defects until the fully designed scheme is completed by December 2025. This treatment will be carried out by March 2024.   

Works were held in abeyance until the CIP programme was developed and pending an intermediate treatment solution being agreed.

3. It has been confirmed with Amey that the design process will be completed by 31 March 2024 and the required works will be completed by 31 March 2025.