Month: Mar 2024

I commented upon a post about the state of the roads in Derbyshire.
Their post was this;

Why don’t some pothole repairs last?

We’ve been trying to keep residents up to date with where we are with fixing potholes on our roads at the moment, and one of the most common questions we get back is why some repairs just don’t last.

We know this is the biggest frustration, and we share it. We definitely don’t want to get to know a street on first name terms.

It can be the weather, materials or the surrounding road condition which means repairs don’t last. Particularly when it’s wet or freezes, this can mean repairs don’t last as long.

Sometimes we have to do temporary repairs for safety too. Or because we’re coming back to do permanent works soon (we’ll try to put signs up to let you know this where we can).

So, we do want to do one-and-done lasting fixes or resurfacing where we can, and we’ll keep trying to improve this, but hopefully this explains why it isn’t always possible.

Cost effectiveness wise, it costs less than £60 for a pothole repair, in comparison to tens of thousands to resurface a section of road. One recent example of this is the works on Bolsover Market Place: temporary safety repairs cost less than a few hundred pounds, and the permanent resurfacing works we’ve just done cost more than £50,000.

It also takes time to design and plan in permanent resurfacing works, with the need to organise things like surveys, traffic management and checks to see where utilities equipment might be.

If you want to find out the answers to some other frequently asked questions about potholes please visit our website. The link is in the comments below.

My comment was;

They do not last because you are using poor quality companies, with disinterested workers using once outlawed techniques such as inferior surface dressing, which literally redresses the road for a camera opportunity then starts deterioration immediately. Your managers lie to councillors stating that surface dressing is a long term repair and will last a minimum of three years, and sadly they are naive enough to trust those words without further discussion or investigation
When potholes are reported, if people can get to report them, given that when there are appropriate modern apps to do so, like fix my street, you realise their reports make you liable, so ban their use. Again lying to councillors who really have no interest in keeping residents safe.
The smaller repairs you undertake are inferior,  and more akin to those undertook by rogue traders in the 1970s and 80’s upon peoples driveways. Probably the same cowboy companies are often used by DCC as successful tenders do not need to meet quality standards, just be cheap.
You then argue constantly about who is responsible for the reported repairs. Reported seem to vanish in the either, and if you look at those roads in Tupton, Grassmoor, Hasland, Storforth Lane, Clay Cross and even close to your head office in County Hall, where I personally have reported potholes to Call Derbyshire #CallDerbyshire and your app, if thevreports are actually acted upon, where an entire stretch is damaged but only one hoke will be repaired …badly.
I ride a motorcycle and for us, that do, for horse riders, cyclists, pedestrians as well as in many cases car drivers, every pothole and road disrepair (and actual so called repair such as again surface dressing or resulting ridges) are a real risk to life. When I do ride now, it’s not fun, it’s constantly looking at tarmac to ensure I do not have an accident. If you doubt this I will gladly take any of your managers ir councillors out for a day around Derbyshire. #derbyshirehighways #DerbyshireCountyCouncil #derbyshire

They replied to me:

Thank you for your comments.
Surface dressing is widely recognised as a value for money solution to seal the road surface from rain water. Rain and frost are the biggest enemies of our roads as combined together they damage the surface and foundations of the road.
Some surface dressing work is contracted to suppliers who work nationally and to accredited standards.
We also check the surface dressing works and make sure contractors rectify repairs that do not meet our standards at their cost.
With 3,500 miles of roads across the county, we have to prioritise the potholes we repair, for safety  and financial reasons and to minimise disruption for local road users. This means that we are unable to fix every pothole at every site.
Recent exceptional weather conditions, including last October’s Storm Babet, brought a month’s worth of rainfall in a matter of hours. On top of this, we’ve had double the usual rainfall over recent months.
We’re not alone in dealing with these issues – the weather has created pothole issues across the country.
We are currently fixing around 2,000 potholes every week.

So my subsequent response is this;

Derbyshire County Council your response in my educated and informed opinion is absolute tosh. Whoever checks the quality of work undertaken needs either retraining or dismissal. Again I make the offer to take any or all of your managers, councillors or executive officers out for a day on motorcycles to demonstrate just how deadly the roads here are, and to prove there is little or no actual quality control. We can look at areas with no repairs along with areas where your claim that quality repairs have been undertaken. I am almost 57yrs old, I have lived through many Storms, and far more extreme weather than in recent years,I have been driving and riding 40 years and have never known the roads anywhere in the UK to be as bad as Derbyshire roads currently are. We can also ask reporters from the The Mirror The Guardian Reuters  and even the local Derbyshire Times , Highlight The Truth
Derbyshire County Council Derbyshire Bikers Volunteer Riders UK #derbyshirehighways Peak and District MAG #peakdistrict #peakdistrictnationalpark #northeastderbyshire #derbyshiredales #matlockbath #countyhall #ambervalley #southderbyshire #highpeak High Peak #derbyshirefireservice #eastmidlands East Midlands Ambulance Service #airambulance #dlraa
The offer of a ride out on a motorcycle is open to any anyone with a vested interest in the safety of all road users not only in Derbyshire but anywhere in the UK. We are tired of the risks we all take every single day.
We have amongst our numbers nationwide parents, their children, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, cousins, nephews, nieces, friends, partners, and they may be  tradesfolk,mikitary personnel, people employed and those unemployed, for whatever reasons, we have butchers, bakers… police officers, teachers…. I myself was a social worker ……doctors, nurses, porters, celebrities ……. the list goes on, yet it seems Derbyshire County Council,  along with other council officers and managers all over the UK, and more importantly the politicians from all parties who have allowed cuts to services we pay for, show nothing but contempt for our lives, the lives of anyone using our unfit for purpose neglected roads.
This is an opportunity for those responsible to experience the risks before making glib responses from their office chairs.