Potholes report followed-up

AudlemOnline has been sent the following letter by local resident Peter Oxley about the state of local roads which he wishes as many people as possible to see. It has been copied to Antoinette Sandwich MP and Audlem Parish Council. The top illustration shows potholes etc reported so far by Peter.

Dear Councillor Bailey,

Firstly, congratulations on your recent election as leader of Cheshire East Council.

I cannot however, congratulate you on the condition of the highways in and around your ward, in fact the neglect of your authority in this area, despite years of requests from various individual residents, motorists, cyclists and Audlem Parish Council, is something of which you should be deeply ashamed!

We seem to have suffered year on year of neglected, potholed, dangerous roads with deep ruts, water leaks, broken surfaces, lack of road markings, bad & missing signage and other hazards which have only seen abysmally poor so called 'repairs' which seem to local residents to really only be a PR exercise for the council in claiming how well they have done (something which is well recognised as the WORST feature of this authority) in terms of numbers of holes filled.

The sheer numbers tell their own story however, as had the authority been maintaining and renewing the road surfaces properly, (like Shropshire seem to manage) this high-volume of issues would NOT be occuring.

These dire quality repairs have lasted just a few days in many cases and the effectiveness of the so called 'Velocity patcher' vehicle is frankly laughable.

These roads (A529 and A525 in particular) have been so badly neglected that only complete resurfacing is going to remedy the issue: You do not put a sticking-plaster over a deep wound! We have previously had astonishing excuses, even 'the weather' from the previous Council leader and this is not acceptable to road users any more!

Even when a small repair has been appropriate, (it usually isn't!) the quality of the work and expertise used has clearly not been up to standard (check out a proper road repair on the A525 from the Shropshire border to Woore) and members of Audlem Parish Council recently relayed examples of poor practice by your contractors being witnessed by them personally, which means the repair will inevitably quickly fail and wasting thousands of pounds of local tax payers money in repeating the same repairs over and over! This is exceptionally short sighted and poor highway management.

Speaking as both motorist and a cyclist, I am now genuinely afraid to use a pedal cycle on the road locally now as the astonishingly dangerous surface is simply too risky to ride on where there is vehicular traffic.

I wonder if you see the irony of the recent announcement that the Tour of Britain cycle race is to visit our borough? I wouldn't recommend our routes be used!

Also, given the recently announced rise in our already too-high council tax here, we do not want to hear any more excuses about funding for this urgently needed work!

Now: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

It is time for some action before people are seriously injured or die on the roads here due to the ongoing neglect of Cheshire East Council.

Peoples patience has now expired and we want to see some thorough, QUALITY, LONG-LASTING proper tarmac resurfacing of the carriageway on the road to enable safe transit by the public! (And no...cheap, nasty and dangerous 'Tar & Chippings' are NOT a quality fix).

Please will you now commit to a thorough highway safety inspection that takes into account the safety needs of ALL road users on these badly damaged and dangerous roads?

I discussed this recently with Audlem Parish Council and they agreed.

It seems astonishing to local residents, that given that some of the most awful road faults on the A529 have such a close proximity to your own home, that you have not acted on this issue already?

And anyone who claims that the third-world road conditons in the area are in any way 'acceptable' or 'safe enough' as some of your highway officers have claimed previously, then I suggest you 'Get on your bike' as Norman Tebbit put it, – and find out for yourself just how dangerous these roads really are !

I await your urgent response as to what quality, long-term corrective actions you intend to effect and how soon these will take place?

Regards

Peter G Oxley
(Full address was supplied)

PS Attached: See here a feature this week on Audlem Online, plus the AOL 'Chatbox' forum on the subject (see AudlemOnline Chatbox over recent days) and some photos of the appalling road conditions, some on A529 very close to your own home! (Two are featured today in this story)

PPS All the road faults I have seen have been reported: We await your actions. Please see map at top of story showing the faults/potholes reported on the A529 and A525.

Statement from Cheshire East

A Cheshire East Council spokesman said: "Our highways teams take local highways concerns seriously and are dealing with these complaints in Audlem as a matter or urgency but we would like to point out that all repair and maintenance works across the 2,700 kilometres of highways network in the Borough have to be prioritised.

"We would encourage residents to report these matters directly to us so that we can respond accordingly and deal with the issue in the most effective way for the benefit of all our residents and road users.

"Residents can do this using our 'Report it -- Track it' online reporting tool on the Cheshire East Highways web site https://www.cheshireeasthighways.org/report-it-general.aspx .

"This enables our residents to locate the issue on a map and send photographs directly to Cheshire East Highways.

"They can also follow the progress we are making with the highways issue they have raised with us, by tracking their enquiry, keeping them up to date with information. This is a quick and easy way for alerting our highways engineers directly.

"It is not possible for us to constantly monitor all social media platforms to find out about any concerns but our teams do a fantastic job and work hard to keep our road network safe and of the highest standard."

"Resources have been on the roads in the Audlem area carrying out repairs and further work is planned to take place on the A525 from 29 March. This work will include carriageway repairs as well as works on signs in the area."

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