Flooding & Road Closures around Audlem 24th Oct

Flooding & Road Closures around Audlem 24th Oct

I am grateful to the representatives of Cheshire East Highways and United Utilities who met earlier today to seek a solution to the current highway impasse and share below the subsequent update I have received.

Cllr Rachel Bailey

update begins:-

'In relation to the phone calls to the emergency number on Saturday, the Council is currently looking into the issues experienced and an update/further information will be provided once there is more information on what the issues were here.

In relation to the issues on the A529, we placed an emergency road closure here due to the flooding issues experienced, however this did clash with an existing pre-planned closure on the A525 by United Utilities. This then placed additional pressure on the surrounding local roads. The emergency road closure on the A529 was to prevent vehicles from driving through the flood and we have had a tanker there most of the weekend trying to pump the water away to enable the road closure to be removed. We did manage to remove the flooding, however once removed, due to surrounding water levels and the run off from the surrounding land, this has meant that the flooding has re-occurred, resulting in the emergency closure being placed back on.

We have been co-ordinating the closures with United Utilities and we have issued an instruction to United Utilities informing them they must suspend work on the A525 and reinstate any areas they had excavated. However, they currently have a deep excavation in place and this may take a couple of days for them to backfill and reinstate to enable their closure to be removed. Once the A525 Woore Road is safe to reopen and the associated diversion signs have been removed by United Utilities, we will then sign the approved diversion route for the closure of the A529 Green Lane which will result in traffic having to use the A525, A51, and the A53. We appreciate this is a lengthy diversion however, when part of the Cheshire East strategic network is closed, we must sign an official diversion utilising roads with the same level of classification.

Our Operational teams have adopted a collaborative approach with United Utilities and there is a tanker on the A529 Green Lane pumping water off site and this will continue for the rest of today. Our highways team will also mobilise additional resource onto the A529 Green Lane to carryout drainage investigation work and this will be ongoing as we need to establish the root cause of the flooding in this area. To deter traffic from using local access roads signs will put in place at the start of both Hardys Lane & Chapel Lane advising that these roads are unsuitable for HGV's.

We apologise for the delay and frustrations caused, this was a developing situation in relation to the significant rainfall expected and unfortunately this then caused issues in relation to the existing planned UU closure on the A525 and we are working to rectify the situation as quickly as possible. However, if you have any further concerns or issues then please do not hesitate to contact me and I will be happy to discuss further. We will keep you updated as things progress in relation to the above'.