Highways bosses insist top quality resources will be used to repair major roads

Members of Lincolnshire County Council’s highways and transport scrutiny committee heard that all the “major roads” in the county would be repaired using “hot rolled asphalt” to ensure that they will last at least 20 years.

At a meeting on Monday (December 8), Coun Christopher Reeve (Reform UK) said that the council report showed that “the details identified at these locations include extensive material failures within surfacing”.

The Scotter Rural division councillor went on to question whether the best products were being used “to achieve a 20-year lifespan”.

Sam Edwards, head of highways infrastructure and laboratory services at the county council, said: “We are talking about our big roads – our big strategic roads. We pretty much – without exception – use hot rolled asphalt which is a far more robust surfacing.

“It takes a lot more pounding. You get a lot more screwing from HGVs (heavy goods vehicles) as they’re going round junctions and things like that.

“We pretty much use the top quality product if that’s the term we want to use. As far as the defects, they can come from a myriad of things.”

Mr Edwards went on to say that it is the contractor’s responsibility to fix any defects in the road resurfacing and that this doesn’t come at a cost to the county council.

He added: “You can get a little bit more rain than you wanted or the temperatures can drop or there can be an issue with the plant or the way they’ve delivered it. You get defects and sometimes you get failures, or bonding failures or issues. What we’re saying is those issues are owned by the contractor.”

The county council has put forward a list of roads which are in serious need of repair with an estimated total cost of approximately £12 million.

Coun Kevin Clarke (Labour – Boultham division) asked which, of the proposed list of roads for resurfacing, were the ones which were in the most need of repair.

He added: “Are these sites the highest scoring or have they just been selected across the county?”

Mr Edwards said that the county council will always focus on the “top priority” roads in need of repair first but acknowledged that some of these schemes may be pushed back to the following year.

He added: “There may be other developments happening in the same place.

“There may be other work going on that means you can’t get in that year and you have to plan for the following year, or you could be outside schools and you need to do it in the summer holidays.

“But we pick the ones that we can deliver in the year but we’re still getting round, always, to the top priority list.”

The executive councillor for resources and the executive councillor for highways and transport are due to consider the proposed programme of works between December 15 to December 19. A formal decision will be made at a later date.