Highways crews are now “focusing their attention” on fixing potholes in Northampton’s roads caused by the cold weather, the county council’s highways chief has said.
After a week of severely cold weather, including periods of heavy snow, many roads in the town have been left badly damaged and eroded in places.
Councillor Andre Gonzalez De Savage, county council cabinet member for infrastructure and public protection, said it was inevitable that the snow, ice and heavy rainfall would create some potholes.
He said: “Three years ago the county council started a more proactive approach to repairing the roads – taking more time to do longer-lasting semi-permanent repairs rather than doing quick, temporary ones.
“This has gone a considerable way to making the road network more resilient to winter weather but even so the recent conditions will have had an effect in some areas.
“Our maintenance crews have been working round the clock, clearing highways and footpaths of ice and snow.
“However with the current thaw conditions, highways crews will be able to focus their attention on assessing any damage to the roads and addressing it.”
Earlier this month, the county council announced that the Government has made £3.7million available for highways maintenance over the next two years – an additional amount to the £16m earmarked for preventative highways repairs in 2013/14 and 2014/15.
The Government has made £2,457m available in 2013/14 with a further £1,315m on offer for the financial year 2014/15.
The county council’s highways network covers about 2,500 miles, more than half of which is on the unclassified road network that are mainly the local roads in the areas where people live.
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