£11.7 Million to Fix Roads

21 March 2014, 07:25 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

£11 million pounds is being split between council's in the East Midlands to repair roads damaged by bad weather.

Nottingham, Leicester and Derby will get around £200,000 from the government, Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire will get around £1,500,000.

Derbyshire will get the most, almost £3,000,000 but the council have told Capital that while they're happy with the cash, it won't be enough to sort things out properly.

'Not enough to mend roads'

In Derbyshire, prolonged and heavy downpours battered roads across the county causing extensive damage in some places.

Over the past five weeks, the council's Call Derbyshire contact centre received an average of 780 road-related calls a week in addition to potholes reported online; they're got in extra staff to deal with the problem.

Councillor Dean Collins, Deputy Cabinet Member for Jobs, Economy and Transport, said:

'Any extra money is of course to be welcomed, but it is unlikely to be enough to mend all the roads that have been damaged by the weather this winter.

'We've already got our road workers working extra hours to fix the backlog of potholes over 3000 miles of Derbyshire roads.'

Nottinghamshire County Council are pleased with the money though, Councillor Kevin Greaves, chairman of the County Council’s transport and highways committee:

'This is welcome news, coming as it does against a backdrop of £154m of savings that we as an authority are having to make as a result of Government funding cuts.

'An extra £1.5m will enable us to fund the repair of at least 7,500 more potholes across the county.

'That would be in addition to the 34,000 pothole repairs already made each year and on top of the £2.8m we are spending this year on making those repairs.

'We now look forward to hearing how we can bid for a share of the £200m announced in yesterday’s Budget.'

'Safer and smoother journeys'

In all, £183.5 million of extra funding is being given out, enough to repair 3.3 million potholes.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said:

'Damage to roads causes misery for drivers and local communities and the severe weather over the last few months has made the problem worse.

'This extra money will help make a real difference to the millions of road users and residents across the East Midlands who rely on local roads, giving them safer and smoother journeys.'

The councils receiving funding are: