Highways Maintenance

The RAC attended nearly 8,000 pothole-related breakdowns in the first quarter of 2024, up 53% on the previous quarter, ‘a clear sign that the UK is suffering a pothole epidemic’.

A plan to invest more than £5.4m on improving roads and transport in Stoke-on-Trent has received a green light.

The carriageway repair bill for local roads in England and Wales has reached a record high of £16.3bn – double the promised £8bn funding uplift from the Government.

Buckinghamshire Council has pledged to hold HS2 Ltd to account to secure compensation for damage to its highway network from HGVs helping build the high-speed rail line.

The AA attended more than 600,000 incidents involving vehicles damaged by potholes last year, new figures released on National Pothole Day today reveal.

The number of pothole-related claims increased by a record 40% last year when compared to 2022, the latest data from Admiral Car Insurance has revealed.

Scotland is ready for winter, the country’s transport minister has said but warned that recent weather events should serve as a warning to take action on climate change.

Councils ‘desperately need’ more highway maintenance funding to address the deteriorating condition of local roads, the AA has said after its worst September fixing ‘pothole-related’ breakdowns for five years.

Roads minister Richard Holden has promised to chase down every local authority without a lane rental scheme, as part of a ‘war’ on potholes and those who cause them.

Half of drivers say the state of local roads is their top motoring concern – a record high since the RAC began asking for motorists' views on road conditions.

The Department for Transport has admitted it does not have a timescale for the billions of pounds for road resurfacing that it announced on the back of the decision to curtail HS2, suggesting that the claim may merely be a pre-announcement of future routine funding.

Transport for London has pushed back against criticism from the influential leader of a London Borough over the allocation of central government highways funding.

This year is looking to be one of the worst on record for damage caused by potholes, according to the AA, after a wet July saw pothole-related breakdowns up by a fifth.

National Highways has generally delivered well for road users over the past year but faces continuing challenges with its big projects, its monitor has said.

RAC patrols attended the highest number of what it calls ‘pothole breakdowns’ in five years during the last three months.

Plymouth City Council has been fined £200,000 after its failures to comply with legislation led to employees developing hand and wrist conditions.

Insurance experts have warned councils over a rise in fake claims for damage to vehicles caused by potholes.

Transport for London has selected new sites where mowing frequency will be reduced, following trials.

The AA attended more than 52,000 ‘pothole-related’ breakdowns last month, which was 1,735 a day and a 29% increase compared to the same month last year.

Some councils in England are taking over a month on average to fix potholes once they have been reported, a freedom of information request has revealed.

The Scottish Liberal Democrats have called on the country’s new transport minister to address its ‘crumbling’ roads after pothole repairs on the trunk road network fell by nearly 30% in 2021-22.

Plymouth City Council leader Richard Bingley intends to resign from his position next week, according to the ruling Conservative group.

Contractors working for Plymouth City Council cut down 110 trees at night before an injunction forced them to stop work.

A report into the Sheffield street trees scandal has laid the blame firmly at the door of the former leadership of the council for misleading its own independent panel and adopting 'unacceptable' tactics against opponents.

Ministers are set to announce an extra £200m for local road maintenance, representing around half of the annual cut to funding that was put in place since for each of the last four years of the current parliament.

The Government spent 31 times more maintaining motorways and major highways last year than funding councils to repair local roads, local authority leaders say as they call for more funding to fix potholes.

More than 70% of local authorities and their contractors now manage their road verges 'for nature', using road verge guidance published by Plantlife, the wild plant conservation charity said.

Motoring organisations have marked National Pothole Day with calls for a cash injection to improve local roads and new statistics which they said showed the poor quality of the network.

The nation’s leading winter service conference and exhibition, Cold Comfort, will be completely free of charge for the public sector in 2023.

Local authorities have nearly 1.5 million tonnes of salt stockpiled across the country ready to treat icy roads and pavements this winter, a new survey has revealed.

The AA has warned that England’s local road network ‘cannot take another round of cuts’ after official figures showed that a third of English councils' B and C roads were rated in amber or red condition in the last year.

Council leaders have warned that local authorities will struggle to maintain roads and street lights, and will face salt shortages this winter due to spiralling inflation and the price of energy.

Kiely Bros contracts director Keith Brett has taken over as chair of the Road Surface Treatments Association.

Taking place in just two weeks, Cold Comfort 2022 will feature cutting-edge presentations from experts working in a fast-moving winter service and resilience sector in a rapidly changing climate.

A senior Department for Transport (DFT) official has played down the possibility that city regions will divert government cash intended for road repairs to pay for their plans to improve bus services.

Ministers have announced a second, UK-wide round of the ADEPT Live Labs programme, with a particular focus on making the construction, maintenance and running of the country's roads more sustainable.

The cost of the 'pothole repair backlog’ across England and Wales has jumped by nearly 25% in the last 12 months from £10.24bn to £12.64bn, in a major warning sign of the devastating impact of inflation on the highways sector.

Essex County Council has responded to attempts by Sir Rod Stewart to repair potholes near his home by warning that people who take matters into their own hands ‘are putting themselves and others at risk’.

County and rural councils will see their funding for road maintenance fall by nearly £500m by April this year, new analysis has warned.

Road maintenance funding for councils not receiving settlements through combined authorities appears to be facing a cut of around £200m over three years following the Spending Review - more if you add inflation.

Local authority leaders have warned that driver shortages could affect gritting services this winter.

Funding for local road maintenance has been cut by £400m this year, the Local Government Association has warned.

Councils have been forced to take emergency action after the heatwave caused some roads to melt in the sun.

A major local government insurer has called for local authority pothole funding to give greater focus to cycle paths and footways to protect cyclists and e-scooter riders.

Councils have warned that they face a £400m reduction in local road maintenance budgets this year.

Twenty-five areas across England have been selected to receive a share of a £150m fund to develop new flooding responses.

An independent report into the procurement of highways-related services at Liverpool City Council has called for the highways service to be completely restructured after finding a culture of ‘rule avoidance’ leading to excessive costs.

The Welsh Government has announced an extra £12m for local authorities to 'fix potholes and improve roads, pavements and active travel routes' across the country.

County councils have said they will have ‘no choice’ but to cancel high priority highway maintenance works next year after the Government announced capital funding allocations down £398m on current levels.

A £19m package of cycling schemes in Cornwall risks going significantly over budget and missing what is already a revised delivery date, auditors have warned.

The Department for Transport has confirmed that local authorities in England have been allocated £500m from the £2.5bn Potholes Fund next year.

Transport secretary Grant Shapps has confirmed £93m for three major road upgrade schemes across the country, including schemes funded as part of the major road network (MRN) and the Local Large Majors programmes.

The Scottish Government is facing calls to adapt its approach to the Bellwin emergency scheme to help cash strapped councils hit by extreme weather.

A major survey taken to mark National Pothole Day has found that 81% of local authorities believe the pothole crisis has become worse over the last five years.

More than half of drivers believe the condition of local roads has deteriorated in the past year despite the drop in car use due to the pandemic.

The National Highways and Transport Public Satisfaction Survey this year threw in new questions and provided new comparisons although the big question remains the same: of the 109 authorities that took part, who came out on top?

The AA has accused some councils in England of doing ‘next to nothing’ by way of maintenance on their road network.

To help you keep your winter maintenance knowledge warm until the Cold Comfort conferences and exhibitions resume in 2021, we are excited to be launching a brand new initiative for you THIS MONTH...

Transport secretary Grant Shapps has launched what his department called a first-of-its-kind audit into the mapping of potholes in England ‘to better target improvements so that roads are in top condition as people return to work and school’.

The next physical Cold Comfort Scotland event will now take place on 22 April 2021 with its place in the calendar this September filled by a new virtual event – the Cold Comfort Digital Academy.

North Yorkshire County Council’s newly-formed highways company has appointed Ross Bullerwell as its managing director.

Roads minister Baroness Vere has written to the highways sector calling on it to keep working through the crisis and sending an emotional thanks for their efforts.

The new Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB) has been launched with its own new web location, making it easier and quicker to find information in what is known as 'the highways bible'.

The UK is split over whether to close non-essential construction sites as Scotland and Westminster form different policies in reaction to the COVID-19 crisis.

Council directors body ADEPT has emphasized the important role of local authority highways key workers during the current COVID-19 lockdown.

The maintenance backlog for local roads in England and Wales has increased by 14% to £11.14bn up from £9.79bn reported in 2019, according to the leading survey in the sector.

Highways England has issued guidance to its staff and supply chain as it plans to keep operating the strategic road network as close as possible to 'business as usual' throughout the coronavirus threat.

Only one in 10 local authorities are meeting their own target times to fix potholes and other road defects, new research has revealed today.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak has announced more than £27bn will now be spent under the second Road Investment Strategy (RIS2) between 2020 and 2025, as he also pledged an extra £2.5bn for local road maintenance in the Budget.

Council leaders have warned the number of extra cars being driven on the roads would cover the entire length of Britain’s coastline if lined up next to each other.

A transport minister has warned Transport for London and the local council not to expect special treatment over its bid for cash to re-open Hammersmith Bridge.

Local authority leaders have said there is a ‘chronic need’ for investment in local roads in response to a report on the number of substandard road bridges in Great Britain.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has revealed which councils will receive a share of the latest £93m round of Challenge Fund cash.

The Department for Transport has released the self-assessment questionnaire that will determine the 2020/2021 Incentive Fund allocations for highway authorities in England, excluding London, with £151m up for grabs.

West Sussex County Council has paid £4m in compensation to Amey over a contested highways procurement process.

Chief executive of Highways Term Maintenance Association (HTMA) George Lee is stepping down from the role at the end of March to work on his own consultancy business, Transport Network can reveal.

The Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) is recruiting a new chief executive after Mike Harper announced that he will be stepping down from the role after the organisation’s annual conference on 2 April.

Kier has appointed Nicola Hindle as group managing director for its highways business, taking over the role vacated last year by Dave Wright.

Blackpool Council has saved £1m and filled in more than 5,000 potholes by using artificial intelligence (AI) technology to detect road damage.

Shropshire Council has provoked controversy after it was reported that it is spending about £1,000 a day on a potholes consultant, despite rating itself a top performing council under a government self-assessment process.

Kier has been brought in to manage the 15-month interim highway services contract in Birmingham after Amey's failed PFI deal in the city.

The RAC attended significantly fewer breakdowns for pothole-related faults in 2019 than the previous year, despite a surge in the last quarter.

Amey has appointed Lucy Fell as account director for the Highways England Area 10 maintenance and response contract.

Warwickshire County Council has been named the country’s joint top performing county council for highway maintenance in a key survey for the second year in a row.

Infrastructure firm Kier Group has announced the appointment of Matthew Lester as chairman of its board of directors with effect from 1 January.

Authorities and companies working on the English and Scottish road networks sent gritters out at the weekend as low temperatures saw significant snowfalls.

When rain and floods hit South Yorkshire early in November, Amey, which provides highway maintenance services to Sheffield City Council through the £2bn ‘Streets Ahead’ PFI contract, was in the front line. Transport Network gets a briefing on its efforts.

The Department for Transport has backed calls for long-term funding for local roads and suggested this could include a cross-government proposal to Treasury to pool funding with the communities department.

Highway authorities could be saving millions and reducing CO2 emissions if they switched to warm mix asphalts (WMA) on road construction and maintenance, MPs have said.

Birmingham City Council’s highways PFI vehicle has launched a search for a subcontractor to operate and maintain the city’s roads for a 15-month period in a deal worth up to £85m.

Roadside verges should be cut less to protect wildflowers and pollinators, new research has found.

The Department for Transport has published guidance to help councils apply for a share of nearly £350m to improve local roads.

Highways England has been given a reasonably clean bill of health by its watchdog's annual report, although more progress must be made on safety, customer satisfaction and the continuing delays to delivery.

The Department for Transport has (DfT) confirmed funding of nearly £350m for councils to improve local roads.

Highways England has teamed up with the Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre (GEIC) to 'explore the operational and road user benefit of incorporating graphene into assets such as road surfacing and road markings'.

Council leaders have admitted the money they cut from road maintenance funding since 2010 could have paid for the repair of nearly eight million potholes.

Amey has agreed to pay Birmingham City Council £215m to terminate its Highways PFI contract following a high profile court case.

MPs have called for a front-loaded, five-year funding settlement to tackle the ‘extreme state of disrepair of the English local road network’.

Key bodies in the sector have backed the Commons Transport Committee’s call for the local road network to be given the type of five-year funding settlement that the strategic road network benefits from.

Emma Greedy reports from the glitz and glamour of the Royal Hall in Harrogate’s Convention Centre and the 28th Cold Comfort.

The road maintenance backlog in London has hit more than £1bn for the first time, as the capital’s boroughs concede they are presiding over a state of managed decline.

A series of free CPD accredited workshops supported by the Department for Transport's (DfT) start this week, bringing together the science and technology of data analysis and highways surface treatments with effective funding models to help councils get more life out of their roads.

The show preview and updated programme for Cold Comfort 2019 have been published.

Technology company Yotta has announced major upgrades to its flagship connected asset management platform, Alloy.

A look back at the winter that was in Scotland - but isn't quite over yet - and the opportunities milder weather gave for trials and testing.

Guidance commissioned by the Department for Transport on tackling potholes has been released.

Road safety vehicle specialist Blakedale will showcase the best of its self-drive traffic management fleet of vehicles at Traffex next week, including a ‘revolutionary’ crash cushion.

Rick Green, managing director of Hanson Contracting, follows in an honourable tradition of Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) leaders who make no apologies for complaining. However, Mr Green has overseen a change in lobbying approach that is perhaps starting to have a real impact. Dominic Browne reports.

Recent increases in local authority highway maintenance budgets appear to be stemming the decline of local roads, according to the publishers of the 24th Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey.

Alan Sheen, director of Eurodome Ltd, highlights a recent incident that operators of timber salt storage domes should take note of.

Key figures in the sector have backed the publishers of the ALARM survey in calling for sustained and consistent funding for the local authority road network.

Manchester City Council has hit out at the ‘unacceptable behaviour’ of workers who dumped diggers in the middle of traffic works over a dispute over alleged non-payment.

A longer guarantee on street works and new asphalt standards are among the proposals from the Department for Transport as part of an update to the street works code.

Registration is now live for both Cold Comfort 2019 and Cold Comfort Scotland 2019 – Transport Network’s annual winter maintenance conferences.

Councils paid £2.8m to drivers for damage caused by potholes in 2017/18, according to new figures.

Ministers have allocated £23m to fund research and trials into technology that could among other things help stop potholes forming.

A nationwide survey has highlighted significantly different response times by councils when it comes to filling in the most severe potholes, with three quarters adopting a risk-based approach.

VolkerHighways is set to deploy the latest technologies on a new highway maintenance and improvements contract with Bath and North East Somerset Council worth up to £70m over 10 years.

Roads minister Jesse Norman has warned against complacency in managing winter salt stocks, telling councils that his officials will be keeping a close eye on them.

Former director at the Department for Transport (DfT) and current director of the RAC Foundation, Steve Gooding, shares his opinions about the pace of innovation and development in the highways industry.

Having represented SRN users for around three years now, Transport Focus evidence base is emerging as potentially world class, something chief executive Anthony Smith is rightly proud of.

Roads minister Jesse Norman has revealed plans to move local roads closer to the kind of five-year funding package enjoyed by Highways England, revealing his officials are already working on a business case.

London’s boroughs have said they are not getting a fair share of road maintenance cash after they were awarded only £17m of the extra £420m for local authority roads announced during the budget.

Nottinghamshire County Council is in talks to take over the firm responsible for its highways maintenance.

Council directors have called for a systematic change to the ‘broken’ system of funding for local roads maintenance.

This autumn saw the completion of the handover phase of the £450m National Roads Telecommunications Service 2 (NRTS2) contract, which Highways England awarded to telent Technology Services Ltd in late 2017.

The chancellor has announced an immediate £420m cash boost for local authority highway maintenance budgets with millions more for local transport projects.

The Department for Transport has published a draft road investment strategy for 2020-25, setting a ‘deliberately ambitious’ vision for the strategic road network (SRN) in 2050.

Wolverhampton Council has cut disruption on its roads by using a Velocity Patcher to fill potholes on roads across the city at speed.

Delegates at CAV Scotland 2018 will be able to enjoy an autonomous driving experience in a colourful and distinctive AurriGo PodZero, designed to carry four people for journeys from transport hubs to and from a wide range of destinations.

Transport Scotland has advertised its first two next generation trunk road contracts, worth around £700m each.

Highways England has valued its new combined Maintenance and Response contract for the East of England at £490m over 15 years.

Harrow Council is looking for a highways maintenance contractor in a deal that could be worth £110m over 10 years.

A lack of sufficient funding to maintain local roads means potholes are ‘wreaking havoc’ with drivers, the RAC has said.

Transport secretary Chris Grayling has announced the first of the 'major road' schemes, although the Department for Transport has yet to reveal the network itself.

A council covering one of Britain’s wettest areas has said it needs a ‘miracle’ to solve its highways structural maintenance problem.

Liverpool City Council plans to put £280m worth of highways works out to tender barely eight months after officially ending a contract with Amey and bringing service back in-house in order to make savings.

The condition of roads is now motorists’ top concern as nearly four in five rate them as poor, according to a major study of drivers’ attitudes.

Oxfordshire County Council has approved plans to borrow £120m to repair roads and other council assets.

Hampshire County Council hopes to save at least 200 work days a year in its Highways Operations Centre through the use of Robotics Process Automation - a digital technology that assists staff by automating everyday tasks using computer code.

The two councils covering Oxford have struck a deal that will see the city council provide routine highway maintenance services on its streets on behalf of the county.

Warwickshire County Council is facing possible legal action after delays in repairing a pothole led to the death of a cyclist.

Local authority leaders have called for more funding for local road maintenance as second quarter pothole-related breakdowns hit a three-year high.

Highways England is to test whether speed limits through motorway roadworks can be increased to up to 60mph at weekends or different speeds used in different directions through the same works.

Amey has been ordered to pay Birmingham City Council more than £50m in compensation after the contractor lost a long-running court battle earlier this year, according to reports.

Dominic Browne gets the latest on how the strategic road network operator is helping beat the cold and share its knowledge.

Pothole-related car insurance claims have risen by 171% in the first four months of 2018, new research has revealed.

A large delegation from Highways England will join other public sector representatives from across the British Isles and international experts in the field of winter maintenance at Cold Comfort 2018 next month.

Ministers plan to make pavements the default location for new utility infrastructure, to cut down on roadworks and potholes, it has been reported.

Following a trial of sensors that can report when road gullies are getting blocked, a highway authority has said the technology will require further work before being widely used.

Lincolnshire County Council is seeking contractors for highway maintenance work that could be worth £762m over 12 years.

The RAC has blamed the recent bad weather for a rise in the proportion of pothole-related breakdowns in the first three months of the year but warned that the full extent of the problem remains to be seen.

An insurer has warned that the deteriorating rural road network is in danger of cutting off countryside communities.

An updated programme has been announced for the 27th annual Cold Comfort winter maintenance conference and exhibition next month.

Transport secretary Chris Grayling has announced almost £100m extra cash for councils to help repair roads badly affected by recent cold weather.

Councils across the UK have spent at least £43m dealing with compensation claims from potholes over the last five years, according to a cycling charity.

Transport Network caught up with 3M technical specialist Andy Fish for an exclusive interview on the topic of Sign Clutter, as well as his career in the traffic signage industry.

This year’s ALARM survey has recorded a triumphant headline result for local authorities in England and Wales with the estimated highways maintenance backlog falling by almost 23% to £9.31bn from £12.06bn.

Contractors have called for a step change in funding for local roads after the industry’s benchmark survey found that more than 24,000 miles of road will need to be repaired in the next year.

Neil Gibson, first vice president of council directors’ body ADEPT, gives his views on what makes successful partnerships between local authorities and suppliers.

The Court of Appeal has found in favour of Birmingham City Council over Amey in a long running and occasionally bitter highways dispute, rejecting the company's 'ingenious new interpretation of the contract'.

FM Conway is investing £7m in its vehicle fleet ahead of the introduction of tougher standards from next year under London’s Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ).

The RAC has said it fears that roads will suffer further degradation following last week’s freezing conditions and that spring may see nearly as many potholes as daffodils.

Transport Network caught up with David Walters, chair of the National Highways and Transport Network (NHT) Survey Steering Group, at the NHT conference last month.

Attendees at the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) Annual Conference 2018 next week will hear from a range of high profile speakers how the future highways sector will develop in the face of funding shortfalls and new technology.

Crisis-hit Northamptonshire CC has been told to rip up its 2018/19 budget, which would have made drastic cuts to highways and transport spending, after auditors warned it could be illegal.

Spending on road maintenance by Scottish local authorities has fallen by nearly 20% in real terms since the beginning of the decade, but the condition of local roads has improved and spending increased slightly in the last year.

Budget cuts have hampered collaboration between Scotland's highway authorities while financial pressures are likely to make the structure of 33 separate authorities unsustainable, transport bosses have said.

There are now nearly 3,500 substandard council-maintained road bridges in Great Britain, with only one in 10 likely to be repaired in the next five years.

Recent initiatives from the National Winter Service Research Group (NWSRG) have reinforced what has been long recognised – regular calibration of spreading vehicles optimises the spreader’s performance. Steve Sinnott of Econ Engineering Ltd reports.

Highways England is to hold a supplier day next month for three contracts or frameworks worth up to £580m in its Area 10 in the North West, in what could be the last asset delivery style contracts to be let for some time.

Rachel Adams, head of transportation weather consulting at Vaisala, lifts the lid on the excellent work of the National Winter Service Research Group.

Scotland's roads could become more dangerous after further cuts to councils' revenue funding, Scottish transport chiefs have warned.

The chairman Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland (SCOTS) has warned of the danger of 'critical infrastructure failure' in roads as a result of the dire state of local government finances.

Carol Valentine, highways manager at Kent County Council, is the first deputy chair of the National Winter Service Research Group (NWSRG). She talks to Dominic Browne about her new role and raising the profile of this vital body.

Dominic Browne talks to Martin Thomson, (pictured) network impacts manager at Transport Scotland, about the National Winter Service Research Group’s (NWSRG) work north of the border.

Cold Comfort 2017 in May was hailed by many attendees as one of the best in years and did much to showcase the outstanding knowledge, research and technology being developed in UK winter service.

Local authorities are entering a new era as they develop a risk-based approach to winter service under the highways code of practice. So will automation provide all the solutions, or do we need more real-time control?

The Department for Transport is facing a choice over how best to support resilience and applied research in winter service, while ensuring local authorities embrace the results and deliver best practice. The National Winter Service Research Group is trying to make the choice an easy one.

A senior figure at the Department for Transport has refused to rule out the use of competitive bidding when it comes to local or regional funding allocations around the proposed major road network (MRN).

Richard Hayes has been reappointed chief executive of the Institute of Highway Engineers, with a two-and-a -half year extension to his current contract.

Drivers on the strategic road network (SRN) want road surfaces without dips, bumps and potholes, with clearer white lines and ‘cats eyes’, and repairs affecting safety carried out as quickly as possible, according to new research.

Local authorities need to take a proactive approach to avoid falling behind as potentially game-changing digital innovation is applied on the strategic road network (SRN) and in large smart cities, council directors have warned.

Highways England could increase the speed limit on motorway road works to 60mph as early as this year, following trials that showed that higher speeds reduced drivers’ heart rates.

This year’s Road Expo Scotland includes an exhibition of more than 100 suppliers to Scotland’s highways industry, many of whom will be displaying the latest technology and safety equipment.

'It sort of looked like a big concrete monster,' Highways England project manager, Jessica Kenny, talks about her first memories of Spaghetti Junction and her recent work completing a £4.7m repair project on the iconic structure.

Kier Highways has won a highways contract with Shropshire Council that could be worth £210m over 10 years.

Fewer than two in five residents are satisfied with road maintenance services by local authorities, new data from the Local Government Association (LGA) suggests.

Highways England has said it is looking to ease the impact of its £100m M5 Oldbury Viaduct scheme following criticism of its ‘unnecessarily restrictive’ approach to traffic management.

Nineteen councils across England have won a share of £75m under the second tranche of the Government’s Highways Maintenance Challenge Fund.

New evidence proves the long-term cost effectiveness of high friction surfacing (HFS), according to key industry groups.

A recent court case should deter Highways England contactors from overcharging insurers for damage to highway infrastructure, according the boss of a claims management company.

Highways England is investigating an allegation raised in Parliament that its contractors are driving up insurance costs by making inflated claims for damage from road accidents.

Infrastructure services firm FM Conway has started to produce its own Polymer Modified Bitumen (PMB), which is added to asphalt mixes to improve the long-term performance of road materials.

A local authority road worker has died after being hit by a truck carrying out resurfacing work.

A pioneering project that has used bin lorries to spot potential potholes is to be extended to new areas and will now include buses and bikes.

Exclusive: A major survey of highways professionals, some at the very top of the industry, has revealed almost unanimous support for a five-year investment strategy for the local road network and strong support for fewer highways authorities.

Skanska has secured a new highways maintenance contract with Cambridgeshire County Council that could be worth nearly half a billion pounds over 15 years.

This week’s hot weather has seen councils sending gritters out as road temperatures of around 50 celsius have caused surfaces to melt.

Scotland’s Roads Collaboration Programme has been tasked with supporting a shift towards more regional management of the local road network. Transport Network finds out what progress is being made and whether the sector is ready for such change.

FREE online entry to this year's Highways Awards closes in one week's time – Friday 23rd June.

This year’s Highways Awards have a judging panel spanning all four corners of the UK – with representatives from Transport Scotland, the Welsh Assembly, TransportNI, the Department for Transport, Highways England and the Institute of Highway Engineers.

Liverpool City Region has appointed Capita to produce an asset management plan for its key route network (KRN) in partnership with Xais.

Hampshire County Council is beginning trials of ‘greener’ warm mix asphalt, which uses less energy and could cut costs across its thousands of miles of roads.

Chris Cranston, the new chair of the National Winter Service Research Group (NWSRG), talks about his modernisation plans, new research and of course how the NWSRG’s Practical Guide for Winter Service will take on the role of national guidance.

Tarmac has secured a framework contract worth £10m a year for resurfacing works across 440km of motorway and arterial link roads around London.

Leading building materials and construction firm Tarmac has announced the acquisition of civil engineering and highways maintenance contractor JB Riney, strengthening its presence in London.

Nottingham-based civil and electrical engineering firm McCann has upgraded the lighting on a 19km stretch of the M62 to LED.

Eurovia UK has achieved certification to ISO 44001 - the new international framework standard for Collaborative Business Relationship Management Systems.

The RAC warned that the condition of the country’s roads is on a knife-edge as it reported a 63% increase in pothole-related breakdowns in the first quarter of the year.

West Sussex County Council and Balfour Beatty Living Places (BBLP) are trialling the use of drones to inspect bridges in the county.

Central Bedfordshire Council has generated savings with a new salt barn that increases salt availability for roads by 20%.

Local authorities and their private sector partner organisations need to continue to develop their winter service strategies even in the face of a succession of mild winters to help develop more resilient roads across the UK network.

Transport analytics company INRIX has launched a new set of digital safety alerts that aim to use Big Data to improve road safety and help manage highway networks.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has published guidance on the adoption of roads into the public highway under the 1980 Highways Act.

Conservationists are urging local authorities to take better care of road verges as a report reveals nearly 100 plant species are threatened with extinction.

The time needed to clear the repair backlog on local authority roads in England and Wales has fallen from 14 years to 12 years, with councils spending more money on highways structural maintenance.

Highways England chief executive Jim O’Sullivan gave Transport Network an interview at Traffex this week and said he was very impressed with the event and confident about his company’s capital funding position.

An update to the national paving management standards is on the cards after the Department for Transport (DfT) announced plans to consult on how new technology could be used to monitor road conditions.

A new report into driverless cars has outlined the core areas of driving that autonomous vehicles will have to replicate, and argued well-maintained roads will be crucial.

English local highways authorities have made major improvements in the Department for Transport’s self-assessment process this year, with 39 securing the top Band 3 status, regardless of any devolution deal, compared to just two in the last round.

Fresh from winning a £40m Highways England contract, Kier Highways is exhibiting at Traffex for the first time this year and is looking to use the event to push boundaries and explore the latest innovations in the industry.

Council and industry leaders have called for a long-term funding solution to ‘the crisis in local highway maintenance’, following the publication the latest ALARM survey, which found an increase in the cost of clearing the repairs backlog.

A director of the Road Surface Treatment Association (RSTA) has asked the industry to sign the organisation’s petition for a portion of fuel duty to be diverted into road maintenance after a jump in the cost of clearing the repairs backlog.

Only four councils remain in the lowest band after the second round of the Incentive Element self assessment, a Department for Transport (DfT) official has revealed.

Infrastructure services company FM Conway has invested £11m in its vehicle fleet, with new vehicles designed to keep drivers and other road users safe.

Today’s Budget for ‘the post Brexit future’ has been criticized for a lack of significant announcements on infrastructure projects such as Crossrail 2.

Hampshire County Council has awarded Skanska a highways maintenance contract that could be worth £1.5bn over 12 years.

Highways England is advertising for bidders for a framework to carry out resurfacing work worth up to £3.3bn over four years.

Professor John Read talks to Dom Browne about the future of highways and why we need to ask ‘what is a road?’

Highways England has awarded Kier Highways a £40m contract as part of new delivery arrangements in the South West.

Council leaders have warned that a spike in the weight of goods transported by lorries could cause a similar surge in potholes.

Car maker Ford has begun research into a virtual pothole map, which could provide real-time pothole warnings to drivers.

Gaist Solutions' managing director went on a trade mission with the PM and found the ‘largest business opportunity ever known to mankind’

An event on Wednesday will see Highways England and British Water explore new methods for tackling drainage problems.

A potentially ‘transformative’ project that uses sensors to help highways teams make better gritting decisions is being launched in Hampshire.

Professional services company Gaist Solutions Ltd has been commissioned to carry out a three-year programme of carriageway condition assessments in India’s ninth most populous city, in partnership with a local firm.

To mark Road Safety Week, Mike Harper, director of Highways at Stirling Lloyd, argues for a return to the fundamentals with more High Friction Surfacing.

Luton Borough Council has awarded VolkerHighways a highway maintenance, major projects and professional services contract that could be worth £200m over 15 years.

Skanska has won a highways contact with Somerset County Council, which could be worth up to £200m.

National Pothole Day arrived on Monday, with reports of increased damage to vehicles and warnings of worse to come, sparking new calls for preventative action – and cash.

Council leaders have called for an extra £1bn annually for local roads maintenance, warning that 2017 could be a ‘tipping point year for potholes’.

Infrastructure services company FM Conway Ltd has boosted its asphalt production and logistics capabilities with the acquisition of two companies.

Best practice guidance for the management of highway liability risk exposures has been revised and will be published early this year, the UK Roads Liaison Group (UKRLG) has announced.

Cumbria CC could start a roll out of ‘plastic roads’ across the county in the new year after it trialled a bitumen substitute on its network this month.

Manufacturing giant JCB has hosted a Highways Management Day at its world headquarters in Staffordshire, attended by a range of highways authorities and contractors.

The Scottish Government has announced an extra £167m for the country’s trunk road network next year and promised ‘a vastly improved motorway network fit for the 21st century’.

Never mind Brexit, on a visit to Unimog Live Transport Network found some German concepts pretty useful.

Dr Lee Chapman is a fine example of an academic that is putting applied science to good use in the industry.

Brushtec's Barry Crackett asks what the UK can learn from some of the world’s cleanest places.

Scottish local government leaders have warned that any further cut to council funding would have ‘severe consequences’ for transport across the country.

Key figures from the transport sector have disagreed about the chancellor’s pledge to spend more money on roads while freezing fuel duty.

The transport secretary has announced further details of £1.3bn of additional funding for roads, including a £925m pot highways authorities can bid for.

Greater Manchester Police (GMP) have released CCTV of a terrifying road rage attack on the M62 motorway by the driver of a ‘motorway maintenance’ vehicle.

Oldham Council has been inundated with suggestions after it invited local children to name its new gritter.

The Autumn Statement will include an extra £1.3bn to improve Britain’s roads and public transport, including backing for an expressway connecting Oxford, Milton Keynes and Cambridge, and ‘billions’ for other infrastructure projects.

Storm Angus, the first named storm of the winter, has caused flash flooding and travel chaos across England and Wales, with many red flood warnings in place and the main rail line to the South West washed away in several places.

Ordnance Survey (OS) has launched a new mapping product that provides ‘the essential facts’ of roads and paths across Britain, which it developed with a £3m investment from the Government.

Gloucestershire County Council has denied that it showed favouritism to Prince Charles by giving special treatment to a road outside his home.

Scotland faces sub-standard road conditions and more outsourcing of frontline services over the next five years due to budgetary pressures, one of the most senior figures in the nation’s local transport sector has warned.

Highways England has completed maintenance works on Spaghetti Junction and the A38(M) in Birmingham a month ahead of schedule.

VolkerHighways has been awarded a £4.7m street lighting contract with the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham.

A parliamentary committee has begun an inquiry into autonomous vehicles, with one industry submission highlighting the ‘real safety hazard’ of inadequate or poorly maintained road markings.

With the chancellor’s Autumn Statement due next month, a leading industry figure has warned of the danger of ‘a local road network that is not fit for purpose’.

Transport Scotland has said that an extra £15m funding will see repairs carried out at more than 50 locations on the country’s trunk roads and bridges during this financial year.

A £7m pilot scheme to cut congestion on the M62 could see motorway-to-motorway slip roads across the country start to use smart technology.

Engineering firm Amey is installing new sensor technology into gullies in Hampshire in a trial aimed at preventing drains that are blocked with silt and waste causing road flooding.

Council chiefs have repeated a call for equality between local roads and Highways England’s Strategic Road Network, following a survey that showed councils receiving one pothole-related claim every 17 minutes last year.

Kier, the property, residential, construction and services group, has sold Mouchel Consulting to WSP Global for £75m – with a reported profit of £40m.

Devon County Council is committing £100,000 to train volunteers to repair potholes in their local areas due to budget reductions.

Transport Network spoke to a senior figure at Herefordshire Council about the work the authority has done to implement the type of risk-based approach advised by the forthcoming highways Code of Practice.

The Considerate Constructors Scheme (CCS) has awarded its first Ultra Site status for a UK highways contract to a longstanding partnership between Nottinghamshire County Council and Tarmac.

Skanska is in line for a highways term maintenance contract with Devon CC after the authority’s cabinet agreed recommendations from officers.

North Yorkshire County Council has achieved a record amount of highways preventative maintenance this summer under a major investment programme that feeds into the county's work to achieve Band 3 status next year.

Next week’s Highways Management 2016 – Smarter roads for the future conference will feature leading lights from the sector and an array of major companies, with a focus on modern procurement and funding issues.

Rubbing shoulders with the top names exhibiting at Highways Management 2016, Pillar Software will be promoting a new product whose story demonstrates the greater emphasis on collaboration in the sector that the conference embodies.

More drivers are admitting using mobile phones at the wheel, while motorists' top concern is the poor condition of local roads, the RAC has found.

Gloucestershire County Council has said contractor Amey, which has come in for local criticism, is now meeting most of its targets as it announced a trial of a ‘game changing’ mobile asphalt production unit.

The Welsh Government has so far spent more than £300,000 maintaining a set of temporary traffic lights for over four years, it has emerged.

Essex County Council has surface dressed and ‘safeguarded for the future’ 3.2 million square metres of its roads over the summer.

The M20 in Kent reopened fully on Sunday afternoon, ahead of schedule, following a successful operation to remove a section of footbridge damaged the previous weekend.

Thurrock Council has accused Highways England of a ‘cowardly’ and ‘despicable’ U-turn over the management of lay-bys on the A1089 Dock Approach Road in Tilbury and promised to write to ministers over the issue.

Scottish Borders Council is conducting a review of its highways maintenance following this month’s Audit Scotland report, which showed the conditions of its roads to have deteriorated faster than any authority in the country.

Hampshire County Council is trialling a new ‘greener' material to repair roads in Hampshire, in the form of ‘warm mix asphalt’.

With spending falling and only 63% of Scotland's council-maintained roads in an acceptable condition, local and national roads authorities urgently need to be more innovative and efficient, according to Audit Scotland.

Highways England’s contractors A-one+ are using a new machine in Northumberland that allows underlying road layers to be recycled and laid back down immediately during resurfacing.

Derbyshire County Council has launched a legal challenge over plans by Sheffield City Region to include the Derbyshire town of Chesterfield in a new mayoral combined authority.

The Government should bolster guidance and standards in the local highways sector to help address a major loss of expertise since the start of austerity, a key industry body has warned.

New research from the RAC has revealed a doubling in the proportion of its pothole-related call-outs in a decade, despite major improvements in the last year.

Amey has named James Haluch as managing director of its newly formed Highways business.

The Department for Transport (DfT) is currently formulating options on a possible expansion of highways lane rental schemes, following successful results from London and Kent.

MPs have agreed plans to give the Sheffield city region combined authority an elected mayor, but areas outside South Yorkshire, such as Chesterfield, are excluded for now.

Amey has put aside an exceptional charge of £55m relating to the possible ‘unfavourable resolution’ of its long-running dispute with Birmingham City Council, the company’s annual report states.

Highways England is equipping itself to give more crisis response help to councils and other organisations, following the success of its support to Cumbria CC after last winter’s floods.

In advance of our groundbreaking conference in Manchester on 23-24 September, bringing together the national and local sides of the highways network for the first time, Transport Network takes a look at some of the major schemes and collaborative working happening around the country.

Derbyshire CC has said the public are being ‘hoodwinked’ over a consultation on plans to put a Sheffield mayor in charge of transport and other services in Chesterfield, in the latest twist in a long-running tug-of-war.

A healthy competition between home nations is always good to see - after all it didn't do Wales any harm in the recent European championships. So Transport Network was pleased to see that after Highways England claimed to

Hertfordshire CC has said that its new approach to fixing potholes and other faults on roadways and footpaths has led to better repairs and saved hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The Government is funding repairs rather than prevention when dealing with wet weather events. Rhodri Clark reports on why proactive planning for the future is essential.

Highways departments are being advised to keep up with summer restocking in time for winter, despite the previous three seasons being relatively mild.

Amey has developed a new mobile asphalt production unit that it said enables highways maintenance teams to work with more flexibility and up to 30% less wastage.

Football legend Pelé kicked off Shell’s ‘Make the Future’ event at London’s Olympic Park, featuring an eco-marathon challenge on a track specially laid over a weekend.

A five-year maintenance and response contract worth up to £70m a year under Highways England’s new delivery arrangements in Kent and Sussex has started.

Highways England has closed a northbound section of the A1 near Newcastle and Gateshead after a hole appeared in the carriageway on Saturday (25 June).

Highways England has completed the contractual process to bring key asset and operational management functions for the East Midlands Area 7 in house, with the award of the final two contracts for the region.

Infrastructure firm AECOM has called for ‘positive action – but not positive discrimination’ to address a significant and growing gender imbalance at apprenticeship level in the engineering industry.

Sometimes roads, railways and vehicles can be the stars of small screen programmes as much as the people in them. Today we’re celebrating our Top 5 transport TV programmes.

Highways England will begin around six months of disruptive works to repair the iconic Spaghetti Junction in Birmingham next week.

The West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) is seeking new powers to enable it to operate a ‘Key Route Network’ for the region, including powers to enforce moving traffic violations and create Clean Air Zones (CAZ).

Council directors have raised ‘serious concerns’ over any potential capital revenue division to the cash devolved to local government under chancellor George Osborne’s business rates plan.

Funding for a proposed ‘Major Road Network’ (MRN) from the future National Road Fund (NRF) should not simply replace existing money given to councils, the architects of the MRN have warned.

A key figure in the upcoming reforms to the national code of practice for highways maintenance has revealed the new code is due by Christmas and local authorities will have two years to implement changes.

Highways England has said a new resurfacing method has seen four times more road surface being laid in one night than an average shift, breaking an internal record.

The Local Government Technical Advisers Group's (TAG) annual president’s conference saw Department for Transport (DfT) heavy hitters welcome the new president Rob Gillespie into his role.

A new vehicle to replace overhead signs, including on motorway gantries, could reduce the duration of roadworks and save up to £4m a year, according to Highways England.

Ministers and London mayor Sadiq Khan have nominated Lord Andrew Adonis to be the chair of Crossrail 2, while Val Shawcross has been nominated as the capital’s deputy mayor for transport.

A shortage of skilled drivers is now the ‘biggest concern’ for UK winter service, according to a senior figure in the sector.

Strategic asset management solutions provider, Yotta, gives some tips on how to approach the DfT's highways self-assessment process.

The key A591 route in Cumbria, which was severely damaged in last December’s storms, has fully re-opened.

Dom Browne speaks to David Quarmby and Phil Carey, the highways experts who are helping to map out a blueprint for a Major Road Network.

Transport Network spoke to John Reed, head of technical services at Durham County Council, about how his council made the journey to become one of the highest rated highways authorities in the country and what advice he has for others.

Highways England has set out plans to save £250m by 2020 through Lean techniques – more than double its Lean savings in the previous five years.

American boffins have developed a concrete mixture that can conduct enough electricity to melt ice and snow while remaining safe to the touch.

A union official has claimed that a Welsh council’s plans to make cuts and privatise some services could jeopardise winter road services and therefore road safety.

Surrey CC has announced plans to open two new salt barns over the next three years and expand a third, as it revamps its salt storage approach.

Newcastle City Council plans to outsource its winter service provision under a maximum 10-year contract worth up to £6m.

In 2014, Transport Network spoke to the Highways Agency, as it was then, about major plans to modernise its winter service provision. The ambitious proposals included talk of what some call the Holy Grail of winter maintenance, freezing point forecasting. Over a year later, we catch up with them again to see how things have developed.

Cash from the much-criticised £250m Pothole Action Fund should be spent ‘in the wisest way possible’, a senior Department for Transport (DfT) official has said, despite ministerial pressure to spend it on filling potholes.

A free highways asset management tool aimed at the ‘pavement level’, to give engineers detailed options on the wide variety of asphalt and the treatment solutions, is now available.

Oxfordshire CC has been forced to cut its street lighting service to deliver emergency support only after a contractor implemented a break clause, raising safety concerns and potentially making some speed limits unenforceable.

A county council’s attempt to reach a sensible compromise over a large stone in the middle of a road has shown the impossibility - and possible £40k cost - of trying to please everyone all of the time.

There will be no revival of John Major's 'Cones Hotline' but a major loophole could still undermine the DfT’s plan to fine authorities and utilities for unmanned road works.

Local authorities, utility companies and bill payers could all face extra costs under a government plan to penalise road works that aren’t cleared before the weekend, officials have conceded.

Ringway has begun its highways contract for Wiltshire Council, which is worth £15m annually and will see locally-based ‘parish stewards’ carrying out minor repairs.

Highways England has revealed it costs around £6m a year to clear litter from its motorways, with more than 150,000 sacks of refuse collected annually at a cost of £40 a sack.

Appendix H is the new winter service section of the Well Maintained Highways code of practice. Launched last September, Surveyor Transport Network takes a look at the impact it has had.

Fines of up to £5,000 a day could be imposed on councils and utility companies that leave roadworks unmanned at weekends.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has revealed the results of the highways maintenance self-assessment process for English councils and the resulting Incentive Fund allocations.

Cumbria’s crucial A591 link, which has been closed since storm Desmond last December, is set to reopen next month ‘earlier than initially planned’.

A snow plough driver has been banned from driving for two years and fined £600 for a drink driving offence.

Major new guidance covering key aspects of highways winter service is due to be completed this summer by the National Winter Service Research Group (NWSRG), Transport Network can reveal.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has confirmed £550,000 of extra funding for the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) – a sector-led body that has been widely hailed as driving improvements in the sector.

The Government has revealed how £50m will be allocated to individual English councils to fix potholes next year but immediately faced strong criticism for its 'short-term approach'.

Contractors working for Highways England are trialling new technology to improve the company’s monitoring of highway equipment on its £88.4m Port of Immingham improvement scheme.

FM Conway and Transport for London (TfL) have launched a ‘unique’ trial to test the use of a high recycled asphalt content for the surface course on the strategic road network.

Councils in the North East of England have entered a four-year framework agreement with thirteen contractors for planned maintenance, which could be worth up to £96m.

The 21st Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey has found councils successfully working 'smarter with less money', with the overall cost of the repair backlog across England and Wales falling to £11.8bn from £12.2bn last year.

A rock in the middle of a road in a Buckinghamshire village will stay exactly where it is, after a suggestion that it might be moved caused ‘outrage’.

Highways England has awarded Amey a maintenance and response contract for the East Midlands that is expected to run for up to 15 years and be worth more than £300 million.

Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council will take its highways maintenance back in-house next month following concerns over alleged blacklisting at contractor Carillion.

A major survey of UK drivers has found 39% suffered pothole damage over the past two years, prompting calls for George Osborne to address roads funding in the Budget.

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) peer review team is working on a plan to become fully financed by councils within three years, Transport Network can reveal.

Transport consultancy TRL (the Transport Research Laboratory), is offering expert advice to help local authorities adopt best practice and secure additional funding.

Local highways authorities are set to improve upon their self-assessment performance from last year's 'dry run' when there were 'hardly any' in the top band, Transport Network understands.

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) is currently updating its procurement and product specification guidance.

Highways England has denied the public was misled over a well publicised 80% resurfacing target that officials now suggest will not be met and was in fact ‘never the intention’.

Work has begun to repair and re-open a key route in Cumbria that was damaged in December's storms.

A pledge by prime minister David Cameron to resurface 80% of the strategic road network will not be achieved, Transport Network understands.

Balfour Beatty has won a £245m highways maintenance contract covering three major councils in the Midlands - Coventry City Council, Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council and Warwickshire County Council.

English highways authorities face random spot checks from the Department for Transport (DfT) this spring, to test the accuracy of their self-assessment submissions to the £578m Incentive Fund.

Council chiefs have vowed to crackdown on spurious pothole compensation claims after paying out £8m in two years.

Flood protection issues took pole position in Wednesday's meeting of the House of Commons' Select Committee on the Environment, which heard oral evidence from leading representatives of the EC Directorate for the Environment in a discussion of respective EU and UK policies on the issue.

The Welsh Government is considering issuing new guidance on gritting to cover both trunk and local roads, following a spate of accidents in recent icy conditions.

Pressure on planning authorities to deliver ambitious housing targets will create substantial pressure on an already stretched highway network, the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport (ADEPT) has warned.

Seven out of ten over 50s say the UK’s roads are in a bad state of repair and have got noticeably worse over the years, poll finds.

Transport Minister, Robert Goodwill has opened a new electric and hybrid vehicle analytical and testing centre at Milton Keynes which will support the government’s drive to ensure that every new car and van sold in the UK will be emission-free by 2040.

Transport Network caught up with George Lee, head of the Road Safety Markings Association (RSMA), to chat about dangers and opportunities, standards and skills, and the threat of driverless cars.

The Welsh Government is seeking a 20% cost saving in trunk road maintenance, which is carried out by local authorities on its behalf.

Rural unitary authorities in Wales want a revised funding formula after statistics revealed most of them are in the bottom half of the road condition league table.

Government-backed innovation agency, the Transport Systems Catapult, has announced ambitious plans to develop 'self-sustaining transport infrastructure and technology'.

Satellites could soon be used by one county council to monitor traffic flows and journey times and even find potholes it has emerged.

Talks are taking place between trade bodies and government departments and agencies over how to improve local engineering knowledge in the wake of the cuts, it has emerged.

Local authorities have stockpiled 1.2 million tonnes of salt to prepare for this winter, exhausting much of the nation’s storage capacity, according to council estimates.

A new study into the future of English highways could break down the barriers between the national and local networks, with its authors suggesting the new concept of a ‘major road network’ (MRN) is already gaining traction.

Leaders in the West Midlands have signed a provisional £1bn devolution deal with government that brings a directly elected mayor to the region from 2017, responsible for a raft of new transport powers.

We caught up with transport minister Andrew Jones at the recent ADEPT annual conference in Manchester for a quick chat about buses, highways and decisions he is glad he does not have to make.

Surrey County Council has estimated it will cost nearly £300m to bring all its roads up to standard.

Merseyside leaders have signed a devolution deal with government worth some £900m over 30 years that will see a directly elected mayor take power in 2017.

Transport minister Andrew Jones talked to ADEPT directors about his plans for buses, highways, lobbying for cash and Stonehenge.

Council directors’ body ADEPT has warned local services will be ‘severely compromised’ as a result of the latest round of heavy government cuts.

Highways maintenance specifications should be changed in response to growing shortages of materials and cash, public sector and industry figures have suggested.

Road Expo Scotland this week is set for a record year with registrations topping the 1,500 mark for the first time ever.

Following predictions of Scotland's coldest winter for 50 years, transport minister Derek Mackay has revealed the country has a record number of snow ploughs and salt spreaders available.

Top transport bodies and researchers have called for more work on comparing the benefits of pre-wet salt and brine road treatment solutions for winter service, after an initial study failed to provide conclusive results.

The new national Code of Practice for highways maintenance will be delayed until at least summer 2016 the Department for Transport (DfT) has announced, due to issues around its ‘risk-based approach’.

New 20-year service life product from Nufins promises 'zero maintenance'.

A free, online asset management training toolkit has been launched by the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP), providing highways teams with a consistent source of long-term planning skills.

Campaigners have warned of a potential widespread loss of local footpaths, suggesting many councils will take a similar two-tier approach to pathway maintenance as they do for roads.

A highways design services contract estimated to be worth between £25m and £50m by Highways England is up for grabs in the East Midlands.

The latest news on the plans for the new highways Code of Practice show a risk-based balancing act taking place and a race against the clock.

Drivers in Britain made around 29,000 pothole damage claims in the last financial year, resulting in local highways authorities handing over £2m in compensation.

Latest feedback on the dry run self-assessment process for the DfT's highways capital maintenance fund and more news from HMEP's continuing effort to improve the sector.

Councils have raised concerns that the Welsh Government's review of trunk road management will result in centralisation which would not necessarily improve efficiency.

Transformation is taking place in the highways sector and authorities must adapt to reap the rewards, Peter Molyneux, head of highways at Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) has warned.

A £292m package of work on Highways England’s A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon improvement project has been awarded to a Balfour Beatty Carillion joint venture.

Scotland’s transport minister Derek Mackay has revealed he is looking forward to addressing his first Road Expo this November, in what is set to be a record year for the devolved nation's largest traffic management and road maintenance event.

David Brewer, executive director of delivery and development at Highways England, talks to Adrian Tatum about the future of the strategic network.

The RAC has called for reforms to councils' legal responsibilities on local roads after a major survey suggests it is a top priority for transport spending.

In an exclusive interview with Transport Network, interim mayor of Greater Manchester Tony Lloyd talks about highways alliances, bus franchising and what London can learn from Manchester.

Three sets of major collaborative procurement schemes have been developed in highways departments across the country, with help from the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP), Transport Network can reveal.

The proposed Derby and Derbyshire Combined Authority would seek a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Highways England but will not push for bus franchising powers, Transport Network understands.

Cornwall Council is looking to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Highways England, setting out a formalised map for future joint working.

Comprehensive guidance on how to manage highways legal claims, such as compensation from pothole-related incidents, has been released by an insurance special interest group.

"Capital” and “revenue” are terms we in local government do not give a second thought to when discussing expenditure on the highways we manage.

Surveyor magazine’s groundbreaking event this September Highways Management: Smarter roads for the future has been approved for Continuing Professional Development (CPD) accreditation.

'From my point of view not many people know what they are doing.'

Passenger Focus recently became Transport Focus after being handed responsibility for representing users of the Strategic Road Network in England from 1 April this year. Transport Network spoke to chief executive Anthony Smith about making the transition to highways, his biggest fears, gamification and the importance of sticking to a plan.

A 15-year contract worth more than £300m is up for grabs on the strategic road network in the East Midlands, Highways England has announced.

Transport Network caught up with Tarmac Contracting's managing director, Paul Fleetham, to talk about the state of the road network and gearing up for the challenges of the future.

A new suite of standardised highways procurement documents has been released featuring innovations that councils ‘cannot afford to ignore’ according to one of its keys architects.

Manchester City Council has announced an £8m investment boost to help improve the city’s busiest roads.

A £150m road maintenance contract in Wiltshire could be ended three years early following complaints from the local authority that the work had not been ‘as effective as had been anticipated’.

A senior highways adviser to the Department for Transport has warned there would be ‘uproar’ if ministers changed capital funding levels for local roads over this parliament as result of spending cuts.

Transport Network has seen a draft copy of the new code of practice covering all aspects of highways engineering and maintenance.

New funding sources could be unlocked for transport if investment was linked to the impacts of improved road safety, a report claims.

A total of seven councils are now piloting greater community and business involvement in highways and place management, including low-level road maintenance and infrastructure development, Transport Network can reveal.

Department for Transport (DfT) director John Dowie has given a frank appraisal of the disparity between local and national roads funding and said Whitehall accepted there was a 'fundamental problem looming' in local revenue levels.

Key figures in the highways sector have lined up to welcome the chancellor's commitment to create a dedicated Roads Fund but expressed anger it appears to entrench the imbalance between local and national spending.

By introducing emissions-based vehicle exercise duty on new cars that will go towards the funding of roads, the Chancellor is sending all the right messages to the highways and transport sector. But what about local roads?

After 30 years experience in highways, Trevor Collett talks to Dominic Browne about his hopes and concerns for the sector and being next in line to be president of the Local Government Technical Advisers Group (TAG).

Highways officers have urged the Welsh Government to replicate a recent three-year borrowing initiative, to arrest the slide back into short-term reactive maintenance.

Highways England has appointed an airports expert and former Heathrow boss as its new chief executive, following the departure of the popular Graham Dalton.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has launched a ‘dry run’ self-assessment process for local highways authorities to see where they stand on the forthcoming incentive element to local roads funding.

Coventry would have to spend £150m to bring its roads and footpaths up to a ‘good’ standard, a council boss said.

An innovative research project could soon see cars sharing real-time data on potholes with other drivers and councils, potentially slashing local authority costs.

Without the engineering workforce, financial investment in regional powerhouses is meaningless - so where does the solution lie?

A long-running dispute between England’s largest local authority and a top contractor has taken another twist, with news that an adjudicator has been brought in.

Highways England and Kent CC have signed a partnership agreement to improve planning and communication between the two bodies.

A senior adviser to the Department for Transport (DfT) has warned the Government against ‘moving the goalposts’ on local highways funding criteria as he revealed details of the planned self-assessment system for local roads cash.

Econ Engineering needs no introduction. Everyone in UK winter service recognises the company’s trademark yellow gritters and knows that our friends in the north have built a winter empire based on trust and quality.

Managing director of Safecote, Mark Dutton talks about changing times in winter service, international trends and the march of liquid de-icers.

Carol Valentine, highway manager for West Kent, talks to Transport Network about getting prepared for the winter to come and of course the Winter Service Practical Guidance - Appendix H.

Highways England has abandoned plans to bring in a new Asset Support Contract (ASC) for the East Midlands, and intends to move forward with a set up that will bring control of maintenance arrangements in-house.

A council has come under fire after painting a set of double yellow lines measuring less than a metre long on a residential street.

Highways England has defended its decision not to switch on newly installed VMS to warn drivers of roadworks on the A590 in Cumbria, despite pressure from local businesses.

A man who tried to sue a council for £50,000 after blaming a moped accident on a pothole has been given six months in jail.

Highways England has thrown its weight behind a groundbreaking event this autumn bringing together strategic roads chiefs, council directors, contractors and the industry’s leading trade bodies to transform the way the local and national elements work in unison.

Chief executive of Mouchel, Grant Rumbles, has revealed his firm will be seeking to expand its presence in the local authority highways market following Kier agreeing to buy the company in a £265m cash deal.

Kier has agreed to buy Mouchel for £265m, creating a highways infrastructure superpower and expanding the number of services the combined firm can offer to local authorities.

Highways England will be at Traffex 2015 to speak directly to the UK traffic and transport industry for the first time since its launch on 1 April.

Europe’s largest traffic management and parking exhibition, Traffex, is set for a record year in Birmingham next week with more companies than ever taking part.

The Institute of Highway Engineers (IHE) celebrates its 50th anniversary this year and in recognition of its long-standing support of Traffex will be offering visitors free membership for the remainder of 2015.

Council directors in Wales have praised the success of the Government's three-year Local Government Borrowing Initiative for highways maintenance.

Wrexham CBC officers plan to close a damaged road permanently because it may be too expensive to repair and maintain.

Potholes and general road maintenance are bigger issues for the majority of motorists than safety concerns, a new survey has suggested.

Industry figures have called for a radical re-think of highways maintenance funding and techniques after the Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey this year showed the backlog for local roads maintenance has increased once again.

Bill Taylor, managing director at Ringway, is clear on where progress must be made in the transport sector.

Trying to get the industry to work together has been a challenge over the years but now one group of authorities is collaborating to find the right approach to asset management. Jon Masters talks to some of those involved.

Senior figures in Highways England have claimed the new company’s multi-billion pound investment programme will put pressure on the nation’s lorry capacity rather than its aggregate industry.

The councils awarded a share of the £275m local highways challenge fund have been revealed today, with some authorities winning double awards and scooping tens of millions of pounds.

The Department for Transport’s (DfT) new local roads funding regime is underway, Transport Network looks at the views and reactions of experts in the sector.

Local government transport leaders were at loggerheads with the Department for Transport (DfT) this week over the success of devolution and funding pots, with pressure mounting for the abolition of ‘infernal’ cash competitions.

The Department for Transport (DfT) is pushing ahead with major changes to permit scheme regulations despite 'significant' concerns raised by local authorities.

Highways England has been formally appointed to be the strategic highways company from 1 April 2015, with responsibility for managing the motorway and trunk road network.

An ongoing dispute between the UK’s largest local authority and its highways contractor over a £2.7bn roads deal has taken a turn for the worse, amid claims and counterclaims over the state of the network.

Transport leaders were notably vociferous at this week’s Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) National Conference, unafraid to take the Coalition to task over funding, devolution, leadership and maintenance.

Motoring campaigners have accused the Government of allowing oversight of the Strategic Road Network to fall far short of what is applied to Network Rail.

Having the right approach to asset management is now even more vital says HMEP advocate Steve Kent.

Highways authorities across England have maintained the condition of key local road assets over the last six years despite severe cuts to budgets, although it has come at a cost to unclassified roads government figures suggest.

A digital road map of England and Wales that could 'transform highways maintenance' has been awarded £3m of government funds.

The UK’s first masters degree in highways engineering management has been extended to allow public and private sector groups from across the country to enrol staff.

Kent CC’s winter service and highways manager, Carol Valentine is rapidly gaining the respect of many in the industry.

The Department for Transport has announced plans to make major changes to permit scheme regulations – one the key local authority tools for managing street works to reduce local congestion - by 1 October 2015.

The Highways Agency is re-launching the tendering process for five major regional contracts thought to be worth more than £1.5bn, and will be reviewing the process to allow 'more ownership of investment decisions' in future.

Councils paid out £3.2m in compensation to motorists for pothole damage caused to vehicles last year, research reveals.

More than half of drivers are struggling to pull out of their neighbourhoods as the cold weather bites and over 10% have been forced to abandon their cars due to a lack of suburban gritting from councils, a new survey suggests.

Motorists are ‘biting back’ today as part of the UK’s first National Pothole Day, shaming roads ‘blighted’ by damage and ‘savaged’ local maintenance budgets.

Council winter service teams have been out in force after a cold snap brought ice and snow warnings for most of the UK.

The UK’s leading traffic and parking exhibition this year features a new section simulating a live public highway to help delegates explore the latest technology and design developments, Transport Network can reveal.

The Government’s National Infrastructure Plan (NIP) has revealed roads cash allocations for the regions together with controversial reforms to the local highways authority capital maintenance funding.

The Welsh Local Government Association (WLGA) is pressing for the Government to provide another highways borrowing initiative, amid fears of a funding ‘double whammy’ in April.

The entire A303 will be dualled and a road tunnel at least 1.8 miles long will be built under Stonehenge as part of a £15bn roads investment plan.

Roads of the future could repair themselves, be made of plastic or solar panels, and could re-charge automated vehicles as they drive to automated car parks. In fact some of this is already happening.

The Government’s £15bn for the strategic road network appears to have shifted the political middle ground with Labour’s new shadow transport secretary Michael Dugher suggesting his party would be more pro-motorist with a localist slant.

Almost a fifth of councils are raising gritting salt stockpiles this winter, with 49% of town halls preparing to share supplies – a poll reveals.

Emergency funding offered to councils in the wake of flooding could soon be directed away from long-term infrastructure repairs.

A measured approach is needed when discussing the future of the UK's infrastructure needs according to Adept's annual policy prospectus. Dominic Browne reports.

Flood funding must be simplified if local authorities are to effectively protect their communities, council leaders have said.

Underperforming local authorities could lose millions in highways funding over the next parliament as the Department for Transport (DfT) pushes ahead with a radical overhaul of how capital cash is allocated.

The Department for Transport (DfT) is undertaking a review of the Codes of Practice on behalf of the UK Roads Liaison Group (UKRLG), covering Well-maintained Highways, Management of Highway Structures and Well-lit Highways.

A local government transport chief has suggested dedicated highways maintenance tsars could help underperforming councils struggling with the weight of the UK’s £12bn local roads maintenance backlog.

Council directors have called for an ‘urgent review’ of Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) and the ‘cumbersome, restrictive and inappropriate‘ transport assessment methodology used in their strategic economic plans.

Innovative patch repair systems include spray injection patching and thermal road repairs, however good planning is essential to achieve a successful outcome.

Prime minister David Cameron has reasserted his commitment to transport infrastructure with a speech today highlighting next parliament’s planned roads spending.

A pair of damning polls has found businesses fear the quality of UK infrastructure is worsening while progress on improvement is being hampered by political uncertainty.

Route based freezing point forecasting, which allows highway gritters to target roads the moment ice is expected to form is regarded by many as the ‘Holy Grail’ of winter service and is in the Highways Agency’s ‘line of sight’ according to one senior manager.

The Department for Transport is under pressure to reform the central code of practice for highway maintenance management, Well Maintained Highways, to give councils more flexibility in the context of diminishing resources.

National resilience to high impact weather such as flooding is expected to improve following the introduction of a new £97m Met Office supercomputer.

Devon CC has announced a plan to use volunteers to fix potholes and trim hedges as it seeks to cut back on highways spending.

Hertfordshire CC is the latest council to successfully complete a highways maintenance peer review and was widely praised across a range of disciplines.

It’s always nice to receive recognition from your fellow professionals, so we are particularly pleased with the outcome of the Local Government Association’s Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) strategic review of our service.

One year since Derby City Council took its highways maintenance service in-house, Thomas Bridge hears how the new approach is reforming work from the ground up.

New figures from the Scottish Conservatives show 17 out of 26 councils in Scotland overspent on road repairs last year, prompting calls for a dedicated pothole fund.

Edinburgh City Council’s transport chief has called on the Scottish Government’s help to fix a £260m pothole backlog in the city.

Capacity issues in local government transport supply chains could lead to ‘inflationary pressures’ on pricing, senior council directors have warned.

In the latest in a series of articles in the run up to Cold Comfort winter maintenance conference and exhibition, Mike Owen director of salt barn manufacturer, Dome UK, discusses salt preparedness.

The Department for Transport’s (DfT) approach to road maintenance funding is ‘ludicrous’, with decades of ‘unpredictable and fluctuating budgets’ putting value for money at risk, an influential group of MPs has claimed.

Dr Howard Robinson, chief executive and company secretary of the Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA), looks at asphalt treatment and winter service.

The Government’s £317m ‘pinch point’ road improvement programme has cut congestion at 39 bottlenecks since its launch in 2011, according to the Highways Agency.

A majority of the public agree that fuel duty should be reinvested into local areas and spent on repairing roads, a poll reveals.

Transport links in Bridgwater and Taunton will receive a £2.8m boost in advance of the construction of the UK’s first nuclear power plant in over 20 years, the Government has announced.

Oxfordshire CC’s Steve Smith explains why asset management is moving the county away from 'worst first' road repairs.

Scotland’s only dedicated traffic management and road maintenance exhibition and conference is open for visitor registration, with Road Expo 2014 taking place on 5- 6 November at the Royal Highland Centre, Edinburgh.

Road schemes designed to tackle some of the UK’s ‘most notorious and long-standing hotspots’ are likely to be announced later this year, ministers have revealed.

Transport Scotland has announced a £1m investment to carry out major repairs on the A82 at Glen Gloy after a landslip caused severe damage to the riverbank supporting the road.

There are a number of ways to tackle potholes. In the first of a new series Transport Network finds out more about the spray injection patching approach.

The second of three major design contracts for the Scottish Government’s A9 dualling programme, each estimated to be worth between £40-£60m, has been awarded.

Council chiefs have called on the Government to clamp down on no-win no-fee compensation claims that they suggest are draining local finances in highways departments among others.

In the second of Transport Network's A - Z series, Findlay Irvine take us through everything you need to know about skid resistance.

Steve Kent, immediate past president of the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport (ADEPT) lays out the case for an approach to funding for local highways and how ADEPT plans to be at the heart of new thinking.

On the face of it Christopher Chope MP, chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Highway Maintenance (APPG), might almost be the central government pantomime villain to local highways authorities’ stepchild. Dominic Browne finds out if there is more to his brand of tough love.

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) – established to develop and spread best practice throughout the highways sector - has received a further £500,000 from the Government.

Road Surface Treatments Association chief, Dr Howard Robinson, on tackling reflective cracking in asphalt.

A review of the National Audit Office’s (NAO) report Maintaining Strategic Infrastructure: roads

Derby CC is planning a £23m highways investment that could see improvements to hundreds of miles of roads in the county.

Scottish business leaders and politicians have called on their government to ringfence money for repairing potholes in local roads.

A major state of the nation motoring report has warned of growing public dissatisfaction with the state of the UK’s roads, local parking services, the costs of motoring and the quality of public transport alternatives to driving.

Council directors have backed recommendations from a government review into national transport resilience, which calls for a shake-up of local highways funding arrangements.

A Department for Transport (DfT) strategic roads chief has conceded the funding system for highways authorities is not 'optimum' and encouraged councils to be flexible in their approach to different finance streams to help utilise the money they receive.

Motorists are ‘losing the plot’ thanks to the ‘forest’ of varying local speed limits introduced by councils, a senior motoring representative has warned.

Council chiefs have unveiled plans to tackle some of the country's most entrenched problems – including the national pothole crisis.

Reinvestment of fuel duty into road maintenance would allow local highways authorities to repair the ‘crumbling’ road network within a decade, council chiefs have claimed.

There is more than one way to improve the condition of your assets but the process really starts with making the best use of data on road conditions.

Highways workers will benefit from the easier and more accurate detection of active or abandoned underground utilities through a new publicly available specification (PAS) issued this week by the British Standards Institution.

Engineering consultant,Parsons Brinckerhoff, has appointed Martyn Brooks as director for local government services within the company’s expanding UK highways, transportation and asset management business. Mr Brooks has 30 years of experience and joins from CH2M Hill, where he held a range of management positio

East Sussex CC, together with its highways contractor Kier, has launched a 'Community Self-Serve' scheme allowing community groups to control small-scale highways projects.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has announced local authority funding allocations from its £168m dedicated Pothole Repair Fund, with all 148 authorities that applied for the cash winning a share.

Over the past few years, national and local governments have seen major changes in the way they are approaching the ownership of their physical assets. One of the key changes has been the adoption of concepts that are now described as 'asset management'.

Only half the public is aware of cuts to their local services but roads and pavements continue to have the highest profile according to a new survey by PwC.

Transport Scotland has awarded a £92m six-year highways contract to infrastructure firm Amey.

Appendix H of Well Maintained Highways is the guide for council highways winter service and was the topic of a recent Exactrak round table debate.

To the highway engineer, slurry surfacing offers a quick, efficient and cost effective way of maintaining skid resistance and protecting roads.

The Scottish Government has announced a further £6m will be invested in the A83 in Argyll and Bute to mitigate the effects of landslides.

Drivers found guilty of motorway speeding could soon face fines of up to £10,000 under new government plans to deter offending.

An overwhelming majority of Scottish residents would prefer transport ministers to focus on repairing and maintaining the existing road network rather than spending more money on new roads, according to a survey released today.

Highways Agency reforms will not be enough to address the problem of unpredictable funding for roads maintenance, government auditors have warned.

The UK's Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) has teamed up with international engineering consultants, Fugro, to provide asset management expertise for highways clients worldwide.

A senior Labour Party figure has criticised the Coalition Government’s highways policy as part of a wider speech outlining his party’s commitment to deficit reduction through a ‘strategic long-term approach’.

Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey headlines must not detract from fundamental problems says Dr Howard Robinson, chief executive, Road Surface Treatments Assocation (RSTA).

The latest official figures from the Department for Transport (DfT) show the proportion of the principal road network where maintenance should be considered was lower in 2012/13 than 2011/12 in almost half (47%) of local authorities.

Milton Keynes Council together with infrastructure company Ringway have officially launched a highways network maintenance and services contract in the unitary, worth up to £200m.

Roadwork crews are toiling away on as many as 25,000 unfinished projects across British highways according to fresh research.

According to Will, a rose by any name would still smell as sweet; and, as with the many hundreds of his lines that are in everyday parlance 398 years after his death, his logic is pretty indisputable. But putting the quill in the other hand, a name is very important.

When you are short of money, what is the one thing you do with your assets? You look after them. You know you cannot afford to replace things, so you repair and maintain them instead.

Telford and Wrekin Council has announced early returns on an investment in new highways asset management software, suggesting it will ‘significantly increase’ the authority's current capabilities.

Warrington BC has announced a £40m invest-to-save programme of highways re-surfacing, to take place over the next three to five years.

It is my belief that asset management of road pavements has deteriorated from a meaningful interpretation of the condition and maintenance of the road and the accurate recording of the maintenance carried out.

For Dr Daniel Ruiz, managing director of Imtech Traffic & Infra UK, the world of traffic and transport is changing rapidly and the industry must raise its game to keep up. Adrian Tatum reports.

West Sussex CC launches a major £30m road maintenance scheme tomorrow (Tuesday 15 April) in attempts to reverse the trend of highways deterioration in the region.

Once again the nation's local road network has been given a dire assessment by the leading ‘state of the nation’ survey in the sector, showing the cost of the repair backlog has increased by £1.5bn since last year to reach at least £12bn overall.

Infrastructure costs for major transport schemes like HS2 are set to grow over the next five years as projects face rising labour and material prices, an industry body has forecast.

Highways experts have reacted to the latest assessment of the local road network showing a £12bn repair backlog, by calling for greater long-term planning and funding as the only way to solve the growing crisis.

Experienced highway engineer Chris Summers takes a look at how road maintenance techniques have changed over the last generation, for better and worse...

Potholes in London injured more than 1,000 in 2013, costing councils hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation payouts, research has revealed.

Infrastructure firm FM Conway has landed three major highways maintenance and public realm contracts in the heart of London, worth up to £450m in total.

Council chiefs have renewed calls for reforms to the emergency financial support provided in the wake of flooding.

First-year operation of the London Highways Alliance Contract (LoHAC) scheme has shown savings of around 15% in maintenance costs, delegates to the CIHT's first-ever national conference heard this week.

Transport Scotland has unveiled a further £10m of new money to help boost trunk road maintenance schemes in the remainder of this financial year.

What does the industry gain from paying more attention to the social and economic benefits of investment in local infrastructure? And how can we use this to influence future funding? Dominic Browne reports from the latest in a series of round table debates.

Councils in England are being offered an additional £140m for repairs to roads damaged by bad weather, transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has announced.

Roads surfacing firms have joined the growing number of calls for the Government to boost investment in the local road network in the wake of the floods, arguing long-term damage has been done.

I offered to take the lead in developing the LEAN toolkit, as I was aware of its importance.

Mayor of London Boris Johnson has thrown his weight behind plans to replace the famous Hammersmith Flyover with a ‘flyunder’ tunnel in the area.

Surrey CC’s repair bill for flood damaged roads and bridges has reached £12.5m for Christmas alone, more than double previous estimates.

The last two years of ‘unprecedented’ rainfall in North Yorkshire has increased the region’s highways backlog to £322m and left it pleading for urgent road maintenance cash before this summer's Tour de France.

Experienced highway engineer Chris Summers provides a basic guide to understanding, and more importantly repairing, the all-too-common British pothole.

Northamptonshire CC has agreed to carry out a review of its pothole-fixing processes, as a result of losing a court case and paying out more than £300 in compensation to a couple whose car was damaged by a road defect.

More than three-quarters of a million households are now spending almost a third of their disposable income on running a vehicle, according to new research.

Liverpool City Council is set to invest £80m over the next eight years in its highways network, in a move set to significantly cut Liverpool’s £256m highways maintenance backlog by 2022.

A partnership between Staffordshire CC and Amey could cut highways services costs by £21.5m over the next five years, councillors predict.

Councils, businesses and utilities today unveiled a new strategy for tackling local streetworks issues in a bid to minimise costs, disruption and the knock-on effects of shoddy work that can add to the UK’s pothole crisis.

Pothole damage costs Scottish local authorities more than £1,600 a day in compensation claims last year, figures suggest.

East Cambridgeshire DC has given the go-ahead to a £30m bypass, dubbed the A142-A10 link around the city of Ely.

The latest period of severe weather has caused widespread damage across the rail and road network as prime minister David Cameron has pledged a further £100m for flood repair.

The Government has released eligibility criteria for councils bidding for a share of the £6.7m local flood relief cash pot, which includes dedicated highways funding.

The first in a series of exclusive articles for Transport Network from the Road Surface Treatments Association, charts the rise and fall of high friction road surfacing.

Wirall BC has awarded BAM Nuttall a four-year highways services contract worth between £30m - £33m, in one of the first deals procured using the new national Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) contract.

The theme of this year’s annual ADEPT conference was ‘Localism and Growth’ with an emphasis on growth - described by president Steve Kent as ‘the word of the day and what we are about’.

The coalition government is now considering how to incentivise councils to adopt not just good asset management but all the HMEP good practice.

Council chiefs have raised concerns over Government plans to put tough conditions on highways maintenance funding for English local authorities, with ‘inefficient’ councils facing a 20% cut.

Gangs of fraudsters could be exploiting the UK’s pothole crisis to cheat local authorities out of compensation payouts, it has been claimed.

Devolved NHS funds could be used by cash-strapped councils to fill in potholes, the medical director of the NHS in England has warned.

The Government is releasing a further £6.7m for councils to support clean up operations following the recent flooding and severe weather.

A motorist in Colchester whose car was damaged by a pothole has won a £500 payout from Essex CC, after taking the case to the county court.

Plans to dim streetlighting, cut the number of ‘lollipop’ patrols and slash £3.4m from the road maintenance budget have been announced by Hampshire CC.

CIHT The Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) is holding its first national conference of 2014 on 19 March at the CBI Conference Centre, Centre Point Tower 103 New Oxford Street, London. The conference is entitled ‘Routes for Growth – ho

The vast majority of local residents are convinced the nation’s pothole crisis is getting worse with satisfaction levels as low as 9% - the worst for five years - according to new research by leading pollsters Ipsos Mori, seen exclusively by Transport Network.

Leading infrastructure companies have been invited by the Highways Agency to bid for two major maintenance and improvement contracts for England’s trunk road network.

Dedicated traffic courts handling cases including speeding and parking offences are set to be established across all 42 police-force areas by next April as part of the Government’s flagship justice policy for traffic.

How the condition of roads can be made better through efficiencies and improved services has been outlined in a new document released by the Department for Transport’s Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP).

Plans to ballot workers on job cuts on the London Underground have been signed off by the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union.

Plans to cut three-quarters of a million from Cambridgeshire CC’s annual winter service budget have been criticised by opposition councillors and the AA.

Medway Council and Kent Police are appealing for witnesses after 40 square feet of Yorkstone paving slabs worth more than £7,000 were stolen from Rochester’s historic city centre.

Cheshire East BC has repaired more than 56,000 potholes so far this year, slashing the number of public pothole reports by 90% in the run-up to winter.

The boss of Atkins’ UK division has backed calls to devolve more infrastructure powers and funding to cities.

Permitting of roadworks has been introduced by Surrey CC in order to reduce congestion and save the local economy millions of pounds, the local authority claim.

Guidance on the use of temporary snow plough attachments for local authorities has been issued by the Department for Transport (DfT).

Future peer review processes under the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) look set to be funded by up-front contributions from the local authority involved, Transport Network can reveal.

The UK’s leading trade organisation for highways maintenance service providers has released a new national strategy for the next three to five years together with a delivery framework and targets.

Transport Network originally reported the LGA had suggested councils were stockpiling an extra one million tonnes of salt this year. This was inaccurate and we have since been informed the true figure looks closer to 50,000 extra tonnes. We apologise for the mistake.

Glasgow City Council has shelved a £65,000 plan to try and prevent pranksters placing traffic cones on a statute of the Duke of Wellington in the city.

Local highways authorities (LHA) should share gritting salt this winter and only go to central government for extra stock as a ‘last resort’, according to a new Government protocol.

Road surveying and consultancy work worth £100k a year for Hounslow LBC has been awarded to technology firm Yotta from the beginning of 2014, it has been announced.

The current president of ADEPT, Steve Kent, wants to see the organisation adapt to the fast pace of the industry and have the ability to communicate better on a number of levels. Adrian Tatum reports.

Dominic Browne talks to Henk Landeweerd, managing director of Aebi Schmidt UK about that and the changing face of winter service.

The HMEP Standard Contract for HMS will be a key enabler to help facilitate other aspects of good practice promoted by HMEP such as greater client contractor collaboration, supply chain integration, LEAN, innovation and incentivisation.

Patching up roads with ‘glue’ has enabled Surrey CC to slash road maintenance costs by millions a year through cutting the use of thousands of tonnes of materials, the councils has claimed.

A multi-million highways contract in Wiltshire is due to be assessed by the local authority’s scrutiny committee following complaints about the standard of work.

Transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has called on infrastructure chiefs to work with Whitehall to develop a skills legacy from its planned £73bn capital spend.

Concern has been raised that a shared space scheme in Southend could be sinking in areas, according to reports.

Overwhelming parish council and local community support for the use of red diesel fuel in any vehicle gritting rural areas has resulted in the move being signed off by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).

The Highways Agency has awarded a £70.5m construction contract to Carillion PLC to convert the hard should of a major strategic section of the M6 into an active lane.

A £28m sea defence scheme has been unveiled along the south coast in West Sussex, providing communities with improved flood protection along its key 7km stretch.

Wigan BC has responded to the first signs of winter weather this year, sending out ten gritting vehicles to carry our precautionary treatments as temperatures fell below freezing in the borough for the first time this winter.

Cash for essential council services such as pothole repair and highways maintenance should not be squeezed any further in the Government’s Autumn Statement next month, council chiefs have warned.

Surrey CC has completed 40 miles of major road repairs over the last six months, equivalent to £14.7m of maintenance work.

A new competition is offering technology firms up to £30k to develop tools to improve highways maintenance efficiency.

Road surfacing contractors have renewed pressure on chancellor George Osborne to announce immediate investment in road maintenance in his upcoming Autumn Statement.

The Government has announced more than £24m of funding to support major highways works in Leeds and on the A452 Chester Road in Birmingham.

A new sub-committee has been set-up by the Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) to establish best practice specifications for road re-texturing and re-profiling.

Infrastructure firm Mouchel has won a highways contract worth up to £60m with Norfolk CC.

The Labour Party together with leading transport experts have called on the Government to scrap its trial of longer freight lorries on safety and sustainability grounds.

Highways authorities should only receive Whitehall cash if they have completed asset management plans, according to the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on highways maintenance.

Transportation plans across the East Lancashire region have been outlined by the county council in the area.

Developers and local authorities have called for clarity on a number of issues associated with the new guidance documents underpinning the Planning Act 2008.

Councils across the country are on alert for potential gritting runs at the end of this week as the first cold snap of the winter season is expected to hit the UK.

The Government has unveiled £100m of funding to help enterprise zones complete key infrastructure projects such as road construction.

Wandsworth Council has repaired more than 6,500 potholes in the last seven months, as part of an extensive highways repair project that is close to its end.

Chancellor George Osborne has vowed to try and freeze fuel duty until May 2015 using more public sector savings to pay for it.

New guidance to help local authority highways departments work across the private and public sector divide has been published by the Government-sponsored Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP).

Labour could reverse the Highway Agency’s £1.5bn plans to create a new toll road to ease congestion on the A14, shadow transport secretary Maria Eagle has revealed.

Peterborough City Council has signed a new highway maintenance contract worth up to £152m with Skanska, covering design, street lighting and drainage cleansing.

Revised information on practical guidance for winter services (Appendix H) of the Well-maintained highways document has been released by the UK Roads Liaison Group.

Communities secretary Eric Pickles has accused councils of ‘ripping off’ motorists after new research reveals British motorists pay out over £30m each month in parking fines.

The Transport Committee has announced a review of winter resilience – the third major study in four years - for the next session of Parliament.

Leeds much-delayed £250m trolleybus project has moved a step closer as local authorities apply for the key powers to build project.

Cold Comfort this year was launched with a round table hosted by Aebi Schmidt (ASH) and Surveyor on the challenges and opportunities that managing winter in and around airports bring for airport staff and local authority officers.

Leading consultants Atkins have appointed Adam Street from multinational giant General Electric to lead the asset solutions section of its highways and transportation business.

Business leaders have warned the UK’s dilapidated infrastructure is one of the biggest threats to the country’s fragile recovery as two thirds of bosses suggest the situation could get even worse.

What some might call a typical Daily Mail online story this week raised a few chuckles in Transport Network towers, but also an important issue.

Resurfacing works on the A46 are due to be carried out over the next month in order to improve the general state of the carriageway.

Hounslow Highways has embarked on a collaborative working agreement with utility companies to share road space and carry out works at the same time to try and minimise disruption to residents and businesses.

A seminar is due to be held at the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation on the shared service arrangements in the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP).

Highways maintenance in Derby has moved back in-house in a move expected to save the city council approximately £300,000 a year.

A leading highways sector body has released a new best practice guide for road maintenance and pothole repair patching systems.

Leading highways contractor Ringway has pledged to create 21 local job opportunities in road worker positions for its client Cheshire West and Chester Council.

Entries have now opened for the 2013 National Joint Utilities Group (NJUG) Awards, which rewards utility companies and contractors.

Residents of Hampshire CC are being asked to voice their opinions on the town hall’s traffic management policy.

Kent CC has begun preparations for winter with the storage of 19,000 tonnes of salt in depots across the county - and more deliveries coming.

A training programme has been developed by the Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) to ensure a skills 'time bomb' does not happen, according to the organisation.

Part of our series of articles from experts in the winter services sector, looking ahead to Surveyor magazine's Cold Comfort conference this year.

Questions have been raised about a backlog of pothole compensation claims in Hertfordshire CC after it was announced the local authority planned to change the process to reduce the burden.

Rising costs and skill shortages are the greatest challenge to the infrastructure sector, civils contractors have warned.

The Scottish Roads Partnership (SRP) has been announced as the preferred bidder for the completion of the central Scotland motorway network project by Transport Scotland.

More than 400 motorists have claimed compensation for vehicle damage on Scottish motorways and trunk roads in the last 18 months, according to a freedom of information request.

New technology has been implemented by West Midlands transport authority Centro to make planning journeys easier, it has been claimed.

Part of our series of articles from experts in the winter services sector, looking ahead to Surveyor magazine's Cold Comfort conference this year.

Britain’s roads are going to go through changes as radical as those when the motorway network was first built.

Motoring groups have welcomed Kent CC’s efforts to protect roads and potholes against oncoming winter conditions.

Drivers could be given a 15-minute ‘grace period’ on double yellow lines under plans floated by the Conservatives today - allowing shoppers to park on high streets and quickly use shops without fear of being fined.

A new joint venture company is to supply building materials on the Isle of Wight while servicing the region’s £750m highways Private Finance Initiative (PFI).

The Department for Transport (DfT) has set out the strategic platform behind the Spending Review’s major transport investment, designed to ‘help transport planners to make the case for joined-up planning’.

The first in a series of articles from experts in the winter services sector, looking ahead to Surveyor magazine's Cold Comfort conference this year on 17-18 September - the main event in the world of winter maintenance.

Peterborough City Council has named Atkins as its preferred bidder to deliver a ten-year highways contract worth up to £150m covering road maintenance, street lighting and gully cleansing.

No one will know better than you that finding, and then keeping, a job in local government is tough at the moment. The Government’s austerity drive has hit the sector hard with trade union GMB predicting half a million jobs in local councils have been lost since 2010. The chancellor’s spending review in J

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) is set to launch a new product on client-provider collaboration this summer, using UK case studies to help establish current good practice.

Local authorities in the capital do not run parking enforcement regimes with the sole purpose of being a revenue generator, London Councils has claimed.

Transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has approved a joint roadworks permit scheme between Surrey and East Sussex county councils, which will ‘save millions by cutting traffic jams’ the authorities said.

The Government are still falling short on roads investment despite outlining £28bn of cash for roads up until 2020-21, according to the leading trade association for the road surfacing industry.

Councils in the South East led by Buckinghamshire CC have called on the Government to bring forward cash earmarked for future road repairs, stating they are ‘shovel-ready now’.

With parts of Britain expecting the hottest temperatures of the year this week, councils’ highways teams have been spreading rock dust to stop roads from melting.

Surveyor's Cold Comfort 2013 conference and exhibition has been awarded Continued Professional Development (CPD) status by the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation for the first time.

Winter resilience has been the central focus of pothole concern for the last few years. But with roads suffering degradation due to extreme heat this month, should we begin to look at summer resilience? James Evison reports.

The Government's new command paper on roads has been welcomed and criticised in equal measure by the transport industry following the announcement of £28bn of highways investment.

Upgrades to two road projects in the Midlands have been given the go-ahead by roads minister Stephen Hammond.

Funding levels for local major transport projects from 2015-2019 will be 33% less than initially suggested by the Department for Transport (DfT), transport minister Norman Baker has revealed.

Blackburn with Darwen Council has announced a £10m investment programme to tackle the backlog of highways repairs and reduce the number of potholes on its roads.

A major review of the standard code of practice for UK highways maintenance will reform the document to take account of ongoing public sector cutbacks, Transport Network understands.

An update on the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme’s (HMEP) Pothole Review has been released by the Department for Transport (DfT), as best practice from the project begins to be embedded across the sector.

Leading infrastructure company, FM Conway, was named as the manufacturing, engineering and infrastructure company of the year at the inaugural London Loves Excellence Awards.

With little in the way of new spending to announce, inevitably much of the focus around the Spending Round has been on presentation and framing of the debate by the Coalition.

The Government’s Spending Round commitment to boost flood protection funding will not be enough to defend the nation against the rising risks - with threats to roads and food production of particular concern - MPs have warned.

The Government is to invest £12.8m into improvements on Nottingham Ring Road, after granting final approval to the scheme today.

Inspections on thousands of utilities reinstatements will be carried out by Edinburgh City Council in a bid to crack down on poor repair work.

Local Transport Bodies (LTBs) will deliver only 40p in the £1 in actual construction work due to the bureaucratic burden placed on the project-bidding regime, it has been claimed.

Portsmouth City Council has agreed to cancel all parking fines issue on 29 July after traffic chaos engulfed the city.

The first shared roads service in Scotland has been agreed by East Ayrshire and South Ayrshire Councils.

The transport industry has given a mixed reception to the government’s announcement of investment in infrastructure with opinion divided across the sector.

The chancellor George Osborne outlined plans to cut the Department for Transport's day-to-day resource spending for 2015-16 by 9% in his Spending Review statement today.

The chancellor, George Osborne, is set to outline his spending plans for 2015-16 and beyond later today, including cuts of £11.5bn across Government departments – with local government in the firing line

Warwickshire CC today announced it has won £7.6m from the Government for junction improvements through bidding on two separate cash streams.

Gloucestershire CC has invited four providers to submit bids for the council highways contract, worth up to £450m.

Leicestershire CC has appointed Phil Crossland as its new director of environment and transport

Chancellor George Osborne is expected to announce a multi-billion pound six-year infrastructure investment programme in the Spending Review this Wednesday.

The local road network could become 'unusable' following another bout of severe weather, highways chiefs have claimed.

Hampshire CC has been awarded £4m of government funding to implement traffic reduction measures on a congested roundabout.

Gloucestershire CC Conservatives has announced each councillor will have £20,000 to fight potholes in their local areas, doubling the amount of last year’s allocation.

Plans to ensure transport planners are trained to the highest level are being piloted by Hampshire CC.

Milton Keynes Council has invited eight companies to bid for a 10-year contract worth up to £200m, covering the maintenance of its roads, bridges and street lighting.

Pay-as-you-go road user charging should be introduced on a voluntary basis with a view to creating a ‘system-wide pricing system for roads’, a leading free market think tank has claimed.

Highways and transportation professionals celebrated the best of this year’s outstanding achievements last night at the annual Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) awards.

The boss of Atkins in the UK and Europe has told Transport Network he remains ‘cautiously optimistic on roads’ despite selling the company's highways business to Skanska.

Cost-effective road repairs and the protection of health services are among priorities for the new administration at Cornwall Council, cabinet members have outlined.

Woking BC is facing legal action from the National Secular Society (NSS) after offering free Sunday parking to churchgoers.

Testing is due to begin on the Luton-Dunstable busway next week, following the completion of a guided track.

Leeds City Council is set to invest £1.5m on pothole repair across the city in the next six months, it has announced.

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation Development (OECD) has claimed the UK should invest more in infrastructure for growth.

Leader of Birmingham City Council, Sir Albert Bore, has delivered his plans to ensure the city has 'among the best transport system in Europe'.

Plans have been put forward by Surrey CC to hand over more control of highways maintenance to community groups, it has been reported.

Southend-on-Sea BC is to spend £15m on transport projects - double last year's total - it has announced.

Charity Plantlife claim local authority road verge cutting regimes are killing off wild flower habitats.

Cheshire West and Chester Council alongside Cheshire East and Warrington Councils have agreed to work together on a new regional transport body.

The Highways Agency has announced further complications with its new Asset Support Contracts (ASC), as the £150m-£200m Area 8 contract is forced into a negotiated tender process due to ‘irregularities’ in company bids.

A new cross-sector roadworks taskforce established to tackle ‘shoddy works’ has resolved to improve contractors’ performances and make claiming compensation easier for small businesses after its first meeting this week.

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) has published new asset management guidance for highways infrastructure today.

Suppliers of transport infrastructure to London are benefiting commercially from the capital’s lack of long-term funding certainty, London Mayor Boris Johnson has complained.

The Highways Agency has today published three route-based transport strategies as the first step in a major shake-up of service delivery on the nation's strategic highways network.

The state of Scotland’s highways has been branded unacceptable by a national spending watchdog after it found a third of local roads were still not up to standard despite warning councils of the problem two years ago.

UKIP councillors at East Sussex CC have called on officers to use miles not kilometres in documentation and signage in a bid ‘to continue being English’.

Concern has been raised by the Freight Transport Association (FTA) and Road Haulage Association (RHA) about recent Department for Transport (DfT) advice on annual statutory tests for garage technicians and mechanics driving HGVs.

Major new transport infrastructure has been proposed in Cambridgeshire to prevent congestion issues in the next decade.

Wirral MBC is re-tendering its highways service contracts this summer, valued at £30-40m.

Transport authorities generally coped well with the recent cold snap but strategies will have to be revised to keep highway networks open in future years, according to an authoritative report published today.

Local spending on highways and transport could be slashed by more than 15% as the Government plans to cut more of councils' budgets, council leaders have warned.

A new cross-sector taskforce has been set up to tackle the problem of ‘shoddy roadworks’, which have cost the taxpayer half a billion pounds over the past two years.

Increased congestion on the M6 and an inability to deal with a projected 25% rise in traffic means the adjacent toll road should be nationalised, Centro chief executive, Geoff Inskip, has claimed.

Transport issues have dominated debate on the local election campaign trail with pledges being made across the country to boost highways maintenance programmes, protect bus services and build new roads.

The latest reports from TRL (Transport Research Laboratory) include a series of documents on reducing congestion, testing networks' resilience to climate change and pavement disintegration.

The top road safety priority for local government is improving road surfaces and reducing potholes, according to a new survey.

House of Commons transport questions this week tackled bus and rail fares, south coast rail capacity and pinch-point and highways maintenance funding.

The Northern Ireland executive will devolve responsibility for roads and off-street parking to councils as part of a package of reforms announced by ministers this week.

The Highways Agency has defended its controversial policy to allow traffic to use the hard shoulder on busy stretches of motorway, as it pushes ahead with efforts to reduce congestion on the strategic road network.

Local authorities could lose the power to fund highways projects through both the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) and Section 278 Highways Act agreements, under proposals unveiled by ministers this week.

Leading road contractor Lafarge Tarmac has won a major highways contract with Halton and Warrington BC worth up to £70m over a potential 10 years.

Highways media specialists have backed Worcestershire CC’s controversial potholes video 'At Work in Highways' as an example of best practice in local authority social media use.

All the news from day one of Traffex,the 26th international traffic engineering, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS), road safety, parking and highway maintenance exhibition.

Norfolk CC has rejected May Gurney’s appeal against being dropped from a £350m highways contract the firm has been working on for the last nine years.

The Highways Agency has promised it is ‘on track’ to meet the tough targets set by the Department for Transport (DfT) for this parliament, despite being unable to release progress figures.

The first of a new range of national traffic signs will be launched at this year’s Traffex event at Birmingham NEC on 16 to 18 April.

With the early severe weather and current financial restrictions affecting efforts to repair the UKs growing number of potholes, James Evison fears there may be no quick fix imminent.

Cities in the developing world need to future-proof infrastructure, including the usage of transport systems, in order to ensure long-term prosperity according to a new report.

Jason Russell, a passionate advocate for HMEP, talks to Dominic Browne about Surrey’s Operation Horizon and the future of highways.

Worcestershire CC, Halcrow and Ringway worked together to develop a new approach to delivering small routine highway schemes more efficiently. Max Wiltshire reports.

Infrastructure services provider, Amey, confirmed today that its acquisition of Enterprise plc is now complete.

Two new reports have been released by TRL which should be of significant interest to Transport Network readers.

Ministers have set the Highways Agency a range of challenging performance targets, including making 20% savings on major schemes and carbon emissions by 2015.

Devon’s unitary authorities have estimated it will take at least £800m to repair the county’s battered road network, following freezing weather and flooding this winter.

Highways work under Transport for London’s (TfL’s) groundbreaking London Highways Alliance Contracts (LoHAC) framework will start this week, potentially delivering schemes worth more than £2bn over the next eight years.

Manufacturing chiefs have called on ministers to prioritise roads spending over rail, as they warn transport infrastructure has become a critical issue for the sector.

Up to 17 million people are expected to take to the roads this Easter weekend, creating congestion on trunk roads and main routes including the M25, M1 and M4.

Severe weather over the last year has worsened the UK’s pothole backlog by £338m, according to the annual ALARM report.

Leading highways maintenance experts have slammed the Government in the wake of the Budget for leaving councils fighting a 'losing battle' against potholes.

Experts across the local government, engineering and transport sectors have given a mixed reaction to chancellor George Osborne’s 2013 Budget, highlighting a range of missed opportunities.

Nearly 70% of Transport network readers believe today’s Budget should include increased funding for highways maintenance, with 60% calling for extra money for sustainable transport projects.

A rise of more than 140% in the number of motorists hitting potholes has been revealed by a new study.

The Government has rejected claims that flood-defence funding has been slashed in half - a move that could leave roads and transport links vulnerable to serious damage following extreme weather.

A standard contract for highway maintenance services is now freely available and two more new HMEP products. All have the potential to deliver significant efficiency savings.

Excluding councillors from the management of the Forth Road Bridges in Scotland is the right decision, influential MSPs have said.

The Government will not change or amend current street work qualifications following consultation on the issue as part of its Red Tape Challenge.

Creating ‘joint communication’ on winter services between various agencies is crucial if local authorities are to learn from issues raised this season, according to a local highways chief.

‘Big data’ analysis software - allowing public sector bodies to cross-reference a vast wealth of different information sets - is the future of local government transport, according to senior figures in the industry.

Following five years of negotiations, a man has won a substantial payout from a London council after suffering brain damage from tripping over a street pothole - some reports put the final damages at around £1 million.

Chancellor George Osborne has come under fire for spending government cash on council tax freezes, when the money could have been used for capital growth projects such as roads and infrastructure.

Highways inspectors in Rochdale BC are achieving ‘significant gains’ in efficiency following upgrades to their mobile working software.

Council gritting teams have hit back at criticism over the state of local highways after a cold snap plunged the south of England under heavy snow from 9 to 11 March.

There are 19,000 separate sets of roadworks currently underway in the UK, covering 834 miles or the distance from Lands End to John O’Groats, according to new research.

The Department for Transport (DfT) needs to give councils more control over refranchising local schemes, a report on Whitehall decentralisation has claimed.

Flexibility and value for money are becoming watchwords for keeping the UK’s roads safe in winter, says Andrew Lupton.

What investment for transport?

Croydon has become the first council to have both its Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) and Local Plan - Strategic Policies (CLP) approved by the secretary of state.

The Government has set out its vision for how infrastructure in the UK can be delivered more efficiently.

Over £290m will be invested in 93 newly green-lit flood defence projects this year, potentially protecting an additional 64,000 homes from water damage.

All 20 areas bidding for the second wave of City Deals have been invited to negotiate new powers with the Government.

Essex CC has announced a fresh £35m cash injection for highways maintenance and improvements to its local road network over the next two years.

The Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) has launched a new code of practice detailing guidance and technical information on crack sealing and joint repair systems for road surfaces.

The Government could more than double its return on transport investments if local authorities were given more freedom to drive projects, ministers were told this week.

The durability of pothole repairs could be ‘greatly improved’ using ‘a few simple, cost-effective’ techniques, according to joint research by Nottingham Trent University and the University of Nottingham.

Council chiefs have blamed ‘decades of under-funding’ and extreme weather for the state of Britain’s roads, after research found one in three drivers have suffered pothole damage to their vehicles in the last two years.

Prime minister David Cameron is considering plans to increase engineering graduate numbers by calling on Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to take a key role, Surveyor understands.

The Institute of Highway Engineers (IHE) has revealed plans to launch a new professional qualification for road safety experts this spring.

Local authorities throughout the UK are preparing themselves for the biggest snowfall of the season today.

Somerset CC has received a £5m funding boost from the Department for Transport for essential maintenance to its highways in the wake of devastating floods.

There is no conclusive evidence that parking tariffs are influencing the decline of high streets or town centres, according to a new report.

Gritting teams across the country have prepared for snowfall this week, as a prolonged cold snap was announced by the Met Office.

Transport Scotland has revealed a key motorway junction - part of the Forth Replacement Crossing project - will open next month ahead of time and under budget.

Councils are being urged to ensure pavements are given the same attention as roads as gritting teams prepare for this weekend’s cold snap.

Over the past 18 months, Surveyor has pressed the case for an effective monitoring and evaluation framework for the Local Sustainable Transport Fund (LSTF).

The so-called ‘Second Battle of Hastings’ had heated up as campaigners have vowed to keep holding-up construction of the Bexhill-Hastings link road.

Council income from parking charges increased by nearly 15% in 2011/12 as town halls raised over £411m, a report finds.

Drivers could face ‘pay as you go’ charging for using the road as part of investment in the nation’s transport system, according to reports in Sunday papers.

Local authorities have been invited to apply for a £170m pot of ‘pinch point’ funding to remove bottlenecks on the road network.

The Government has awarded £2m of air quality grants to dozens of councils in England, as part of efforts to support the investigation of Low Emission Zones and help create guidance for reducing local pollution levels.

TN aims to bring you breaking news, analysis and commentary from the transport industry.

Transport chiefs in Scotland claim they are better prepared for extreme weather events this winter after a series of improvements were made to network resilience and communication with travellers.

Public support for 20mph zones has almost reached an outright majority, according to new research published this week.

A contract notice has been put out by the Highways Agency for the £81m widening scheme of A160/180 - one of four schemes due to be trialled for quicker delivery.

Flooding has returned to the UK with parts of Hampshire experiencing high water levels and damaged defences yesterday afternoon.

Details of cash allocated in the chancellor’s Autumn Statement include a £215m fund for local road maintenance, transport secretary Patrick McLouglin has announced.

Survey shows six potholes per mile of road Although local authorities have managed to reduce the number of potholes over the past year, there are still more than six per mile of road, according to a survey by AA Streetwatchers.

The Government has issued fresh guidance on the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) to clarify its relationship with other types of developer funding, such as Section 106.

Consultation on the Integrated Transport (IT) Block funding offered by the Department for Transport (DfT) includes plans to end ‘perverse incentives’, it has been announced.

Campaigners opposed to the Bexhill-Hastings link road begun direct action at the weekend in a bid to halt the £94m scheme.

Highways departments and winter service personnel are being treated as a ‘soft target’ for cuts, despite difficulty retaining skills in the sector, according to ADEPT.

Blackpool Council will be the second local authority to receive an assessment of its highways maintenance services through a ground-breaking sector-led peer review process first revealed by Surveyor (30 November).

Council chiefs are calling on residents to beware of thefts of grit bins and stored salt, as well as avoiding door-to-door sellers.

The mayor of London has set out plans to double the amount of money spent on the capital’s road network.

Highland Council will maintain its winter gritting budget at previous levels despite spending restraints, councillors have affirmed.

Nearly £150m has been set aside by Transport for London (TfL) for councils in the capital to undertake local transport schemes, it has been announced.

Poor quality streetworks are costing taxpayers over £200m a year and damaging local economies, according to new research by the Local Government Association (LGA).

The Local Government Association (LGA) is assessing plans to pool town hall pension funds, to kick-start the country’s 500 stalled priority infrastructure projects.

What impact will the Autumn Statement have on local government funding?

The next 3 months will see the busiest period to date for HMEP with up to 7 products being released and at least another 5 seeking approval to be progressed. The products and scheduled release dates are as follows:-

Formal pedestrian crossings have been implemented in a shared space area of Coventry city centre, following a review by the local authority of the policy.

The Government will invest £333m in a dedicated highways maintenance fund to support essential works to ‘renew, repair and extend’ the life of England’s road network, it was revealed this week.

Chancellor George Osborne unveiled a ‘revolution in infrastructure financing’ under the Treasury’s remodelled private finance initiative (PFI), in his Autumn Statement.

Council chiefs have called for urgent reforms to highways maintenance funding to tackle a £10bn blackhole in road repairs and prevent a national pothole crisis.

A new approach to road upgrades will be piloted on four motorway-widening schemes, transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin announced this week, as the Government pledged to speed up delivery of highway improvements.

The Department for Transport (DfT) is open to bespoke ‘transport deals’ to devolve more power over local networks to individual councils, transport minister Norman Baker has revealed.

Two out of every five highways in Britain require immediate work on road markings and standards are declining at ‘an alarming rate’, it has been claimed.

Councils are ‘essential’ to successful investment in transport infrastructure, the Local Government Association (LGA) claimed in a briefing released this week outlining future financing and management options for the UK road network.

The next 3 months will see the busiest period to date for HMEP with up to 7 products being released and at least another 5 seeking approval to be progressed. The products and scheduled release dates are as follows:-

Active travel should be ‘the norm’ for short journeys and be encouraged more in local communities, according to new guidance by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).

The introduction of new parking charges in Brighton has cut trade by 25%, according to local businesses.

A new approach to road upgrades will be piloted on four motorway-widening schemes, transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin announced this week, as the Government pledged to speed up delivery of highway improvements.

Two out of five highways in Britain require immediate work on road markings and are declining at ‘an alarming rate’, it has been claimed.

Councils will not benefit from a flood recovery grant scheme to repair roads and bridges following this summer’s high rainfall, it emerged this week.

The most ‘cluttered’ route in the country and remains difficult for disabled access, a survey claims.

Coventry City Council has launched its £6.9m Cycle Coventry project, which will upgrade existing routes and create new ones over the next three years.

The Government’s decision to reduce funding for highways maintenance will worsen the quality of local roads and risks ramping up long-term costs for councils, the National Audit Office (NAO) has warned.

The Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) has announced plans to develop two new best practice toolkits, including a guide to removing inefficiencies in highway maintenance, employing the ‘Lean’ working method.

Ministers have approved the A5-M1 link road, and construction work on the previously-shelved project could now be brought forward to 2014, subject to local planning agreements.

A leading highways industry body has backed growing calls for a regulatory asset base (RAB) model to secure private investment to plug the funding gap in the UK road network.

Legal foundations are being laid for pay-as-you-go road user charging without toll booths, as the Department for Transport (DfT) launches consultation on an automated system for the Dartford crossing.

More regional City Deals designed to improve strategic area-based transport links, similar to the Leeds City region deal, could be on their way, according to cities minister Greg Clark.

Councils in London, together with Transport for London (TfL), could save up to £450m and drive through around £2bn of road investment after awarding four major new area-based highways contracts.

North Ayrshire Council has purchased a fleet of seven new eco-friendly vans, now the largest hybrid van fleet in Scotland.

Concern over the safety of shared-space schemes has been quashed by the author of Department for Transport (DfT) guidance.

Planning permission has been granted by Hounslow LBC’s sustainable development committee for the regeneration of Brentford lock west

New legislation to remove bureaucracy and boost business investment has been introduced to Parliament.

Free parking should be available in Wales’ towns to encourage shoppers onto struggling high streets, the Conservatives have said.

The issue of highways maintenance remains ‘in urgent need of resolving’, according to the industry’s annual ALARM survey – despite a small improvement

In the current regime of driving down cost and delivering efficiencies the focus to date has generally been on the so called “sharp”/operational end o

Northumberland County Council has become the 85th local authority whose roadworks data is now available to the public for free through an online porta

Councils should be given powers over creating their own user charging schemes.

City of York Council has been criticised over plans to shrink its highways budget, which would reduce funding for winter service and axe 16 full-time posts from the department.

Ministers’ plans to radically overhaul how major roads are funded have triggered a series of warnings about the knock-on effect on local routes

Attempts local campaigners to receive a judicial review for the Bexhill-Hastings Link Road have been quashed after the High Court rejected an appeal.

The Government has come under pressure to ensure sustainable transport projects are fully evaluated, to ensure scarce funding is spent effectively.

Test article

here is already clear evidence that where authorities can harmonise specifications on key commodities over geographical areas they will achieve econom

Localism has become a core element of public realm strategy, and communities are embracing the change, Surveyor has learned

Community decision-making has enabled radical streetscene changes to be put in place in Sutton LBC, it has been claimed.

Plans to be released next month relaxing rules on 20mph zones for councils, local transport minister Norman Baker reveals.

Badgers 'could be shot in council car parks'

Legislation which addresses the issue of congestion around streetworks is 'tolerable' - although local authorities do not have enough information to help co-ordinate emergency works more effectively. This was the message from representatives of NJUG and JAG (UK) in reply to questions from the Commons transport select

Local authorities look set to face additional scrutiny of streetscene projects as an inventory is launched, mapping out the cost of different types of street furniture to help residents calculate the cost of 'unnecessary' signage, guardrails and road markings. The tool has been created by the charity, C

Civil engineering contractors have reported a dramatic decline in workloads during the last quarter, prompting fears of a double-dip recession in the industry. Figures released today from the Civil Engineering Contractors Association’s (CECA) workload survey

Mr Cook’s report, published in November last year, recommended reforming the status of the current Highways Agency, ‘giving it a more independent board, which can make better and more flexible commercial decisions with greater financial autonomy’. It also advised the transport secretary take a more

How can we ensure we capture and embrace international best practice in Highway Maintenance? There is clear evidence from the work undertaken by Infrastructure UK that the cost of delivering and managing UK infrastructure is up to 30-40% higher than elsewhere in Europe. Why is this and how can we do more to understa

The Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) has co-ordinated a joint submission to the Government – attempting to represent the transport sector ‘as a whole’ – calling for substantial changes to its controversial planning reform proposals. Leading transport planners, provid

The Government has issued a stark warning about the threats posed to local transport networks due to increased levels of flooding, landslips and dryer summers brought on by the effects of climate change. Comprehensive research – carried out by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) &ndas

Many of Scotland’s roads are still vulnerable to extreme weather conditions, according to Parliament’s climate change adviser. An independent report by the adaptation sub-committee of the UK Committee on Climate Change

The Government vowed to overhaul the nation’s infrastructure this week, as scores of trunk road and rail schemes were approved. But critics have attacked ministers’ lack of support for local highways and public transport projects. Delivering his Autumn Statement to MPs on Tuesday 29 November, the chancell

Matthew Lugg, director of environment and transport at Leicestershire CC, will chair a review into the long-term solutions for pot holes. The review will be wide ranging and examine a number of different facets on the causes of pot holes, using the principles of HMEP to address solutions such as reviewing governance

A second tranche of asset management funding has been awarded to English local highways authorities. Fourteen councils have been successful in attracting an extra £7.5M for well-advanced plans, adding to the £24.5M announced in March. The funding will enable authorities to improve their information hol

Standardisation is a key theme of the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme (HMEP) and hence, one of the programme products is to develop a standard ‘highway maintenance specification’ for local highway maintenance services. There is already clear evidence that where authorities can harmonise specifications on key commodi

Emergency funding is needed to repair local roads damaged by winter weather, according to councillors in a survey published this week. More than half the participating councillors said the £200m from central government early this year had allowed some additional short term repair work to be done, but more money

The preferred bidders for two highways PFI contracts worth almost £3bn have been announced. Sheffield City Council revealed Amey is in line for its £2bn highways maintenance programme, which includes an initial five-year highways-renovation programme, before 20 years of maintenance. And Hounslow L

There has been little Government support of infrastructure investment and more can be done to promote opportunities in the UK, the CBI has claimed. In its report Attracting Investment to UK Infrastructure, the CBI identified four key alterations that would encourage long-term institutional investment, especially in greenfield proj

Prime minister David Cameron announced plans this week to use private firms to expand and maintain the motorway and trunk-road network. This may well have come as a surprise to many in the sector, who thought it was happening already. The proposals – based on the privatisation of the mains water network – may be new in

With the recent announcement that Amey is preferred bidder for a £2bn private-finance initiative (PFI) highways contract with Sheffield City Council, one could easily forget PFIs are not flavour of the month. In theory, the Treasury is still trying to reform the funding model into something which ‘takes advantage of private s

The first HMEP (Highway Maintenance Efficiency Programme) product the Pothole Review was published on the DfT website on 10 April .The report was delivered in line with key attributes of the Programme:- *  by the sector for the sector *  centred on practical ,adaptable approaches; *  results-focused

Normal 0 It is amazingly to reflect back only 6 months ago in the Spring that large swathes of the Country

With the recent announcement that Amey is preferred bidder for a £2bn private-finance initiative (PFI) highways contract with Sheffield City Council, one could easily forget PFIs are not flavour of the month. In theory, the Treasury is

Vinci Concessions and Ringway have landed the Isle of Wight's multi million-pound highways PFI. Isle of Wight Council today announced the consortium as its preferred bidder for 25-year upgrade and maintenance contract. The island's cctv network will also be upgraded and current streetlighting stock will be

Labour would protect local bus services and divert a part of the national highways budget for local authority cycling interventions, shadow transport secretary Maria Eagle has told the party's annual conference.

The Government has responded to calls for longer-term funding certainty for highways maintenance by confirming capital allocations until the next Spending Review. The Department for Transport (DfT) this week wrote to council transportation chiefs confirming previously-indicative allocations for highways maintenance a

Transport for London will rollout Europe’s largest fleet of hybrid buses by 2016, it has been announced.

With the recent announcement that Amey is preferred bidder for a £2bn private-finance initiative (PFI) highways contract with Sheffield City Council, one could easily forget PFIs are not flavour of the month.

London is the least car dependent city in the UK offering good access to key services by public transport, according to research published today.

A new tool to aid train operators improve provision for cyclists has been released by the Department for Transport

Major local roads and motorways should offer more protection against bird casualties – especially low-flying Barn Owls – and the Highways Agency hasn’t done enough to resolve the issue, according to conservation charity, the Barn Owl Trust.

Hydrogen fuel cell taxis placed in London for the Olympic games have to undertake a 130 mile round-trip to refuel, it has been revealed.

Councils in Greater Manchester have been granted new powers to clampdown on utilities companies causing disruption on their roads under the country’s first joint road works permit scheme.

The loss of seven million front gardens to car parking has put local authorities at a greater risk of flooding, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) has said.

The Government must provide fresh guidance to local authorities explaining how planning reforms can be used to protect wildlife and ecosystems, a cross-party group of MPs said today.

New research published by the Welsh Government suggests its policy to enforce a 5-pence charge for carrier bags is becoming increasingly popular with the public.

The leaders of the world’s biggest cities have met in Rio to discuss local government climate change policies.

The Environment Agency has issued a warning of a ‘continued risk’ of surface water flooding across the south-east, following severe flooding in Wales and other areas of the UK in the last forty-eight hours.

Bristol has reached the finals of the European Green Capital Award 2014 (EGCA), remaining the first UK city to be short-listed for the prize.

The Government’s deregulation agenda is stalling the shift to a low carbon society, the UK’s green watchdog has said.

Two London councils have launched a campaign aimed at influencing the nation’s attitude to on-street recycling.

A Lincolnshire council with some of the highest numbers of homes at significant risk of flooding has criticised the Association of British Insurers (ABI) for using flood risk maps that ‘do not reflect reality’.

More than £1m has been set aside for local authorities in England to tackle air pollution, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has announced.

Road networks can help reduce carbon emissions by incorporating energy-saving features into their design, according to the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).

English councils were saved from billion-pound EU fines – should the UK fail to meet air quality and recycling targets – after amendments to the Localism Bill were secured this week.

Cost-effective methods to tackle environmental issues at a local authority-level have been praised by environment minister, Richard Benyon.

The Welsh Government has announced a £3.3m capital funding pot for councils to invest in recycling infrastructure to boost efforts to reach statutory targets and avoid landfill charges.

New standards in LED technology have prompted one local authority to ditch its lamp renewal programme, despite being midway through the implementation of standard lanterns.

Flooding badly hit areas of the UK this week as three people were killed as a result of the heavy rain across the British Isles and Ireland.

Funding for vital flood defences has dried up, the public National Audit Office declared today as flooding claimed the lives of three people across the country.

Whitehall has pledged to enhance the future of solar energy take-up, as speculation over pricing intensifies ahead of a major Government review on ‘feed-in-tariffs’.

New figures have revealed the amount of waste being recycled in Scotland increased last year.

A new project is underway in Greater Manchester in order to improve officers understanding of what types of waste is collected from residents.

Efforts to boost sustainability and tackle climate change in Wales were promoted on a global platform this week.

While the Government has encouraged councils to commit to projects that extract energy from waste (EfW), environmental developments have frequently had to factor in concerns from communities anxious about resultant traffic and transport disturbances.

Speed cameras in Somerset are being removed because they have ‘done their job’ in reducing crashes and casualties.

A statutory public consultation on the removal of the western extension zone of London’s congestion charge began today.

Cambridgeshire CC has lifted the lid on a row with contractor BAM Nuttall that has delayed the opening of its multi-million pound guided busway.

The Government has confirmed it has no intention of revising the Transport Innovation Fund to enable local authorities to invest in public transport improvements without congestion charging schemes.

A Welsh council is taking the Assembly Government to court next month after claiming that changes to landfill allowances has ‘penalised’ its success in reducing waste production.

The public continues to have little patience with how roadworks are managed, according to a Localgov.co.uk/Surveyor magazine vox pop.

London Mayor, Boris Johnson, has hailed a commitment from Thames Water he secured for extra measures to cut congestion from its Victorian mains replacement programme.

London Councils has proposed introducing a capital-wide levy on plastic bags as part of a range of environmental measures to be consolidated into the 10th London Local Authorities Bill. Under the measures approved by London Councils this week, the capital&rsquo

Existing institutional arrangements for dealing with intense rainfall ‘leave urban areas poorly adapted to cope,’ according to the Government.

The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulations came into effect this week, requiring producers of electrical goods to pay for their products to be recycled when they are no longer functional. Under the new regulations, importers and re

The Government has pledged to increase annual spending on reducing flood risk from £500M to £800M by 2011, following the flooding of last week which affected as many as 20,000 properties.

Environment secretary David Milliband has backed the response of the agencies to the outbreak of the bird flu virus in Suffolk.Miliband told MPs the response to the outbreak of the H5N1 strain at the Bernard Matthews site had been "rapid, well co-ord

More use should be made of anti-social behaviour orders to prevent environmental crime, according to the Environment Agency.<

Local planning authorities will be required to find land for waste facilities for regionally-set annual tonneage targets under a big shake-up. The Government has promised a national assessment

Estate agents’ boards are to banned from areas of Hammersmith and Fulham, unless they are granted planning permission first.

Reading,

The Local Government Association made its case for a radical shift in power away from central Government towards town halls this week, to allow councils to fund most transport infrastructure themselves. The transport select committee is investigating whether or not local authorities h