Just down from where I live in Manchester there are two busy roads. Both have been slowly crumbling away for years and are/were in a right state with more potholes, patches and bumps than good road surface left. A real danger to cyclists in fact.
After much complaining from residents three weeks ago the local council completely resurfaced one of these roads along it's entire length. Fantastic new tarmac and smooth as a babies bottom - lovely.
Just driven past 10 mins ago and some utility company is busy digging a trench right down the centre of the new tarmac. Arghhhh, my blood is boiling! Talk about poor planning. No doubt the road will be patched up and left again in a shoddy fashion by the utility company rather than completely resurfaced.
On the second road the council had just added new speed bumps but without resurfacing the whole road or filling in the pot holes. Due to potholes the size and depth of your head, even 10mph is pretty risky proposition without the need for speed humps. Arghhh, what a complete waste of money!
What's going on with these Councils? Are they completely incompetent? This makes me really angry. It's our hard paid taxes they are wasting and on top of this they are constantly moaning that their budgets are getting cut!
Absolute idiots!
Good content. Too much self control.
He is not wrong , we need random caps, swearing and spelling errors
I didn't think the councils had any control over, or say in, what the utilities do, and when?
Okay how's this:
What a complete load of ******g cretinous Apes the local council are !!!!!!!!!!!
Better, but don't associate them with me thank you very much.
Street Works Act
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1991/22/section/56
Trying to guess which roads in Manchester but you could be describing most of them!
I didn't think the councils had any control over, or say in, what the utilities do, and when?
It wouldnt matter if the patching up that the utilities companies did was carried out to a reasonable standard, most of the potholes on the roads in Birmingham seem to be caused by shoddy patching
Some kind of joined up thinking between the utilitiy companies and councils is required!
Bl**dy Council Idiot's what?
You've still got time to edit - try scattering these capitals randomly into the text
H, B, M, R, U, Y, S? -
They're all in this together...
[url= http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/roads/network/local/streetworks/ ]street works act 1991[/url]
of course the council knew the works would happen because the law demands it, however i suspect notice would not be that great. I have read somewhere that some councils are going to start issuing permits.
Was the resurfacing done in March? just before the end of the tax year????
I don't understand why you're blaming the council, even during these hard times, according to you, they are responsive to peoples needs :
[i]"After much complaining from residents three weeks ago the local council completely resurfaced one of these roads along it's entire length. Fantastic new tarmac and smooth as a babies bottom - lovely. "[/i]
And why is it, quote : [i]"our hard paid taxes they are wasting"[/i] ? the utility companies pay for their own work - not the council tax payer. They are required to leave the road in the condition which they found it - if they don't the council has a legal redress. And don't think the council are scared to use it - its not their money if the utility company has to redo the road surface.
As far as why was the work done 3 weeks after the road had been resurfaced, who knows - maybe to was an emergency, leak maybe ? I don't see why the council should hold out and leave a poor road surface because utility companies have work in the pipeline anyway - specially as it's the utility company's responsibility to reinstate the road surface. And it wouldn't cost the utility company any more whether the road they dug up was rough or in good condition.
You might ask of Manchester council [i]"are they completely incompetent?"[/i] but less than a month ago there were local elections and the ruling party made huge gains almost completely wiping the slate clean, so it would appear that most of the other resisdents are actually rather satisfied with their council.
Are they completely incompetent?
yes most definitely if you live in cornwall.
not content to be pulling back services left right and centre, not too mention refusing to spend 1k on 2 of arguably the best beaches in the county for their 2011 blue flag award just because they are not 'council' owned , they are spending 18k on revamping their offices.
but thats noting, how about 9million on corporate credit card expenses (highest in the UK - devon for instance, similar size authority with similar budget spent ZERO) on such necesaries at 1800quid on silk ties, 90000 on magazines and the best 90k one off payment to arab emirates.
and the very best bit... the leader of cornwall council stated that they did not know how many cards there were or who indeed had them.
Last July Leeds council painted all the doors(47 propertys + stair doors) in the block of flats I deliver post to.In January this year they replaced all the flat doors 🙄
Four weeks ago they re painted all the stair doors , I remarked to one of the painters that it was less than 12 months since they were last painted and he told me they had a contract to start replacing the doors starting from October.
It's refreshing to know where your council tax is being [s]wasted[/s] spent.
Gavtheoldskater - CC incompetent?! As an employee of CC I have to say that you're...not far wrong (in some respects)!
Sod off ernie, lowering the tone like that with reasoned arguments and facts.
i work in local gov highways and we never get told of when utilities are going to do work. legal requirement or not. they may tell someone at the council but it never trickles down to the people who need to know. they do what they want, when they want. and whenever we've tried to get the to sort out shit reinstatement they never do. however, when we come across their plant during our works it can massively delay work due to them needing massive amounts of notice to come and check it.
Whilst not really exonerating them of being idiots, didn't it turn out that Cornwall Council had got their figures wrong?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-13584349
i work in local gov highways and we never get told of when utilities are going to do work. legal requirement or not. they may tell someone at the council but it never trickles down to the people who need to know.
you haven't noticed the contradiction in that statement?
the council systems are to blame, utility companies have spent a fortune on systems to be compliant as councils can fine if they aren't
they do what they want, when they want.
because your enforcement of the NRSWA is deficient, sort yourself out and correct their behavior
and whenever we've tried to get the to sort out shit reinstatement they never do.
the act allows you to do the reinstatement and recharge if they fail to correct the fault
however, when we come across their plant during our works it can massively delay work due to them needing massive amounts of notice to come and check it.
is that because you do insuffient site investigation before you start digging? Also why haven't you negotiated a reciprocal agreement to check apparatus found in excavations within an agreed timeline.
HTH
i know that for the most part we come across unknown plant because the utilities companies dont know whats there most of the time. often they tell us somethings there, we do a trial hole and find it. then when we start work we find more that they didnt know were there either.
didnt think my statement contradicted itself. i might have worded it incorrectly though. all i meant was that we-as in the people who need to know- dont find out. thats all.
I just thought that local gov highways were the council 😉
I've been having an interesting discussion with our council.
Our house is on the crest of a hill, we turn R into our drive and garage. There are often a couple of cars parked right on or 2m below the crest of the hill which makes getting in and out interesting as you have to approach in the middle of the road and are unsighted from the other direction. Quite dangerous really, esp if you throw in the speeding mums in their 4x4s taking Quentin and Jemima to playschool. Anyhoo contacted council to have a look at it and see if we could get 3m of yellow lines either side.
When they went to do the survey they had a head on turning into our driveway !!
I thought that might seal it but no, not dangerous enough apparently. Bizarre.
For the last month, I have been a local Parish Councillor.
I only joined, as the Council Tax precept for our Parish had been put up by 26%, when almost every other Council had kept theirs at below 3%.
After 3 Council meetings, I am now totally disillusioned with doing it. Mainly as the other Councillors are so intransigent in their views, that a lone voice is not going to change their thinking. This week, they voted on borrowing £400k to buy a new office.This, despite the fact that the income for the Parish is only £100k/yr.
The current office has just been renovated at £14k. It is quite alright for the 2 people who work there. Yet the other Councillors have a great vision of the future where the Council Office will be the centre of village life.The Parishioners now will have a 40 year mortgage on a building that will cost at least 3 times as much to run as the old one. I can see a big rise in Council tax next year. In addition to this, the Chairman wants to get rid of one of the employees. They cannot be sacked, as they have done nothing badly wrong. So he is going to offer a large sum for the person to leave.
If it on the TV, people wouldnt think it was true.
I'm in a dilema now, as being on the Council does no good at all, as all the crusties on there just go along with whatever is proposed, and I'm there, the lone vote against money being spent on useless, waste of time projects.
Alan.
Emailed the local councilor last night about this. Response was fairly quick to be fair. He's said:
"Thank You for raising this very important issue with me, to much money is wasted this way, when you think there is a massive problem with re- surfacing and potholes across the whole of the Conurbation.
I will come back to you with a response"
Will wait with baited breath!
didn't it turn out that Cornwall Council had got their figures wrong?
now there a surprise. wonder how much they paid a PR consultant to figure that story out. and even, lets say it is true, some of the facts still remain... over 1k on DS Lites, over 1k on iphones, over 1k (in one department alone) on silk ties... and they are just the little ones.
And how do you know that the DS Lites weren't used for children's homes? I have no idea if they're on the take or not, but let's not jump to conclusions...
It must be great to work on the council, all you need to do to meet customer expectations is to be crap and incompetent, anything else is a bonus.
over 1k on iphones
OK, which 2 people got iPhones?
You'll be complaining about high council tax next.
NorthernStar,
Around here in Trafford the roads are a crumbling mess, and the council are struggling to get through the backlog of repairs from last winter, however they have somehow managed to find the money and resources to dig up loads of normal kerbs to replace them with DDA dropped kerbs and tactile paving. 😯
they have somehow managed to find the money and resources to dig up loads of normal kerbs to replace them with DDA dropped kerbs and tactile paving
Well done them!
Oh, hang on, your smiley suggests you don't think disabled access is a good thing - why's that then?
Oh, hang on, your smiley suggests you don't think disabled access is a good thing - why's that then?
Because they have replaced 100mm kerbs for dropped kerbs which is fine, but left the 120-150mm pot holes in the middle of the roads that catch wheels, including cars, bikes, wheelchairs and prams.
I know one set of funding will be a capex budget and another a maintenance budget, but to proceed with non-essential works when there are more urgent repairs needed is daft.