Reading: Potholes Continue to Blight Roads and Damage Tyres

By Denna Bowman

England’s roads are blighted by an average of one pothole for every 120 yards of road, according to a shocking new survey.

The craters are costing motorists who suffer damage to their car tyres or other parts of the vehicle a small fortune to replace their ruined tyres and repair their cars.

Yet it would take a staggering £8.5 billion and 13 years to put England’s roads properly in order, according to the Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA), which represents the road building industry.

While in Wales they would have to wait for 15.6 years to clear the pothole backlog on their roads.

Mike Linley, chairman of the AIA, said: “Free-flowing traffic on unobstructed roads is the most environmentally friendly and the safest. Yet with a road opening or pothole every 120 yards, free-flowing traffic seems like an impossible dream.”

The bitter winter weather has played a large part in driving up the number of potholes by 30 per cent in the past year. However, repeated utility works and council cash shortages also share part of the blame.

The nearly two million deep trenches dug into roads for utility and other works reduce the lifespan of the roads and often lead to potholes, according to the AIA.

The number of trenches in each English local authority area averaged 13,212, while the figure for Wales was 4,613.

The average cost to fill one pothole is £65, meaning it would cost £47 million per local authority to clear the problem.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 1st, 2009 at 6:06 am and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.