Lancashire CC will invest an additional £5m in its road network to help with repair work following flood damage earlier this year.
Councillors in the county said they wanted to prioritise improving people’s journeys when completing the council’s annual budget in February, and have now agreed to invest an extra £5m in renewing vital transport infrastructure as part of an overall package totalling £33.4m.
Around £28.4m worth of improvements were initially agreed, and the county council’s cabinet has now given the go-ahead for a further round of work using this extra £5m.
A further £1.64m has been allocated to urgent repairs following damage caused by Storms Ciara and Dennis in February. This will prevent more disruption to communities, the risk of further deterioration to roads and structures, and allow badly damaged roads to be reopened, says the council.
Also, £1.65m will be invested in improving more of the county’s busy A, B and C roads, as well as those in residential areas, adding to £8.9m already allocated for these roads in February’s budget. Roads are prioritised for improvement according to their condition, and this will allow the programme to be extended to preserve or replace more surfaces in need of repair. A further £713,192 has been allocated to extend the programme to improve pavements, helping to prevent trips and slips.
A further £500,000 will be put towards preventing potholes on rural roads using spray injection patching.
Around £500,000 will be invested in projects to address areas of deterioration on roads which are too extensive to be treated as potholes, but too small and localised to qualify as part of the programme geared towards treating the whole road.
County Councillor Keith Iddon, Cabinet Member for Highways and Transport, said: “We know that keeping our roads in good condition is a real priority for residents and businesses because they support many aspects of everyday life and are vital to our economy. Ensuring we do all we can to support our economy has never been more important as we focus on the task of helping the county recover from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
“We have a long term plan to improve the condition of our roads, and surveys show they are gradually improving due to continual investment over recent years. However the winter weather always presents a challenge, and this year the floods we experienced in February had a particular impact.
“We added £5m to this year’s budget to help deal with issues which emerge over the course of the year such as the flood damage, and areas of localised deterioration, to ensure we can repair them in a timely way and prevent them getting any worse.The extra funding will help to protect the investment we have already made in Lancashire’s roads and boost our existing maintenance programme to bring more of them into good condition.”
