A number of freak weather conditions caused Shropshire County Council to overspend on its highways budgets, according to the authority’s budget monitoring report.
The harshness of last winter’s weather caused the council’s highways team to spend an extra £1.2M to keep its roads open, as its gritting fleet was sent out twice the amount of times it had budgeted for.
In total, the council’s projected overspend within its highways maintenance and severe weather budget stands at £2.37M – 12% of the total budget.
Chris Edwards, Shropshire council’s assistant director for environmental maintenance, said: ‘The overspend is a result from the serious weather we have faced over the last year. The prolonged hard winter also meant additional spending as we turned out 93 times over the 2008/2009 winter to treat Shropshire’s roads, in comparison with our normal average turnout of 50 times. The national shortage of salt also meant we incurred greater costs in procuring salt.’
The report added that the highways maintenance budget was overspent by £1.5M, due to temporary or remedial repairs to the highway and bridge network relating to the September floods.
The council is expecting to receive £689,000 of funding through the Bellwin scheme.
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