More than 150 highway improvement schemes planned across Central Bedfordshire
Friday, 24 May 2024
We've released our Highways Annual Plan for 2024/25 featuring over 150 improvement schemes throughout Central Bedfordshire.
The schemes include road surfacing enhancements, pavement maintenance, drainage schemes, street lighting upgrades, and bridge works. More than 50 schemes relate to road safety improvements, including speed reduction, traffic calming measures, and the provision of disabled parking bays. Additionally, there are 17 schemes relating to rights of way improvements.
To ensure that resource is being allocated in the right place, the council uses a data-led approach. This involves assessing the condition of roads, pavements and other highways assets, their repair history, the types of road, and the local infrastructure it supports such as emergency services, critical utilities, public transport facilities, education providers, and employment hubs.
Speaking about the Annual Plan, Councillor Hayley Whitaker, Deputy Leader of Central Bedfordshire Council, said:
We made some real progress last year with the works carried out on our highways network, which has seen a reduction in pothole reports. This has also allowed us to focus on repairing more potholes this year.
We know that the condition and maintenance of our highways is an important topic for everyone who lives or works in Central Bedfordshire, so I am delighted that we continue to prioritise roads throughout Central Bedfordshire and make further investment.
In total, our highways service is responsible for keeping over 1,400 kilometres of roads safe. This includes maintaining the road surface and looking after more than 220 bridges and structures, over 23,000 streetlights, around 50,000 drainage gullies as well as more than 1,340km of public rights of way across our countryside.
As well as carrying out the planned schemes, we will continue to carry out reactive repairs for issues reported via FixMyStreet or identified through our regular inspection routes. In 2023/24, we repaired over 2,000 potholes, cleaned 23,000 gullies, and fixed more than 1,000 streetlights.