Councillors and committees

Agenda item

UPDATE FROM CABINET MEMBER FOR HIGHWAYS [EXECUTIVE FUNCTION - FOR INFORMATION]

The Cabinet Member for Highways will provide the committee with an update on highway works in the local area.

Minutes:

Declarations of interest: None

 

Officers in attendance: Zena Curry, Area Highways Manager

 

Public Questions, Petitions, Statements: None

 

Member discussion – key highlights

 

1.    The Cabinet Member for Highways would also be attending meetings with representatives from Residents Associations and Parish Councils in Mole Valley to give an update on highways matters.

2.    The report had three annexes showing where money has and is planned to be spent locally. A revised version of Annex 1 is attached to these minutes.

3.    Annex 3 was a new document bringing together information on possible future  schemes, so that Members would have advance notice of schemes and would be better placed to respond to queries from residents.

4.    Members were asked to consider the schemes planned for 2018/19 and direct any queries or comments to the AHM. She in turn would compile a list of these and the relevant responses to be fed back to the whole local committee.

5.    There was still a need to improve how the county council communicates with residents as to the work it is doing. Steps have been taken to improve this but there was still a need for further progress.

6.    The additional revenue funding of £1.4 million would be divided evenly between the eleven districts and boroughs.

7.    The Cabinet Member would provide members with a list of approximate costs to better enable them to make decisions on how to spend their share of the new Member Highways Fund.

8.    The county council had invested an extra £5 million in repairing those roads worst affected by the recent spell of adverse winter weather.

9.    This amount was unlikely to cover the final costs and the Cabinet Member had written to the Transport Secretary to ask for match funding.

10.  Members raised concerns about drains that were not included on the asset register and therefore not being cleaned.

11.  The Cabinet Member reassured the committee that progress had been made, but that the new asset system still needed some updating.

12.  There were still issues with cleaning the gullies; sometimes this was down to the presence of parked cars and work was being done with the district council to try and resolve this problem.

13.  The grass cutting contract had gone back to the county council with fewer cuts planned; Members could choose to pay for an additional cut from their allocation.

14.  The criteria for the Member Highways Fund (£7,500 per county councillor) funding had not yet been finalised but the Cabinet Member was aiming to make it as flexible as possible.

15.  The 2018/19 list of centrally funded schemes would be updated online every three months with details of progress and the reasons for any delay or deferment.

16.  Members queried the expenditure on traffic signals when there was seemingly no problem with the equipment.

17.  The Cabinet Member acknowledged that better information was needed to indicate for example whether the equipment was being serviced/replaced/repaired etc.

 

The Local Committee (Mole Valley)

 

(i)            Commented on the information

 

 

Supporting documents: