Yep - Wiltshire, Summerset, Dorset - that's my patch and the roads here seriously are bad. What's worse is that when they do repair them, they don't last two seconds and are done to a truly appalling standard.

Clearly, many of our roads here have reached the end of their serviceable life and need more than just a resurfacing to deal with them, but no-one is stumping up the cash and getting on with it. Meanwhile, vast amounts of money are being wasted on pointless work in the name of so-called "safety". We've had new traffic lights at West Ashton, Wingfield, Hindon and Wyle, yet there was nothing wrong with them - the latter is now running on a less efficient algorithm and causing traffic to stop for nothing.

There have been stupid bits put onto corners of junctions in Chitterne and Bathford which are totally unnecessary and makes it less clear which way cars are going, and a similar bit on a corner in town. There have been new traffic lights put up at Upton Lovel where a simple re-alignment of the road would have done the trick, and now, like another set of lights nearby, they default to red at night! A handful of new no U-turn signs and others took many, many nights of work on the by-pass. It would appear that it takes 6 men to resurface a quarter of a roundabout, and another 20 to lay the cones and watch them do it.

We've had a piece of open country road (with no pavement) kerbed ( ). It is supposedly acceptable to dig a hole in the road on Friday, leave it all weekend with traffic lights and then fill it in on Monday. There are new flashing signs on a bend on the A36 where, to my knowledge, no-one has gone off the road, and they have now seen fit to reduce the speed limit to 50, on a perfectly good straight bit of road.

Almost every bit of road that gets resurfaced is done not because it needs it most, but because there is something that they can claim is a safety issue (junction etc.) - so that get's done when it doesn't need it, and the bits that do don't. There are often several gaps of a few metres between resurfaced sections rather than the whole thing being done. There was one pothole repair on the A36 that, I kid you not, did not last two weeks. Various lines get marked or re-marked wrongly and often in a dangerous manner. There's a set of traffic lights at the railway bridge at Littleton Panell, despite the fact that even two large cars can fit through it together without the slightest issue.

The whole thing is the biggest farce I've ever known, and the worse thing is that they are spending a fortune on the roads in all the wrong places. Unnecessary new signs, traffic lights, kerbs etc. all seem to get the go-ahead but simply providing a good road surface, nope.

 Visiting from DISCO3.CO.UK
Discovery 3 TDV6 Auto HSE Zambezi Silver


Last edited by Lost for Words on 9th May 2016 10:24am. Edited 1 time in total

Thanks for your comments, guys
It seems I am not alone in my thinking. And Lost for Words seems to have summed it all up nicely! It's "bébéchoon", ackcherly, with accents. 'Steve' to my chums.
20 years ownership of Solihull products, ALL GONE NOW, sniff!
Current motor: Suzuki S-Cross 4WD auto, 1.4 petrol. Oh so reliable! 7 years now and no problems. Oh, all right then, a leaking shocker replaced under guarantee.
Previous:
TD6 HSE L322 Auto FF
2.5 TDi 4-door Classic
Disco II
And my 1st Rangie: in 1995, a 2-door VM 2.5 diesel Classic
Not to mention the Lada Niva before those. (I said not to mention it!)

Lost for Words could be talking about Oz!

Oz state governments employ new management from the UK because they are seen as the experts and who then proceed to screw up our roads/trains/police, too. Ron B. VK2OTC
2003 L322 V8 Auto
2007 Yamaha XJR1300
Previous: 1983, 1986 RRC; 1995, 1996 P38A; 1995 Disco1; 1984 V8 County 110; Series IIA

Unfortunately, we really are world experts here; we are world experts at political spin. So much that gets done is bad/wrong, but it gets huge amounts of praise thrown at it just because it has happened - without anyone taking a look at the overall picture - then loads of good stuff doesn't get done, but it always gets passed off as something bad or excellent austerity meaures or someone else's fault. It's not just politicians who have this talent but, I think, the whole country. We also have a history of putting ourselves down; true British patriotism at its strongest comes in the form of a common belief that anything bad for us must be right!

It's a bit of a problem that we did have excellent road building skills, but somewhere it went wrong. Now we are unfortunately in the position that the newer poor quality roads are failling at the same time as the older high quality ones, so just about all the A and B roads need major repair works in one go. So far, they continue to fall apart ten times as fast as they are repaired, so who knows when it will snap, but it enevitably will.

As far as the authorities go, they need only point at the amount of money they are spending (wasting) and claim that they're doing their best. There's a riduculous nature of taking the most expensive possible course of action in the long term, just because it gives a cheaper option now, with potential for political spin. For example, the A350 from north of here near Melksham and then round the Chippenham by-pass was built with preparations for dualling, so they have double width bridges and land allocated and partly landscaped along side them, but they didn't actually dual them. Now the Chippenham by-pass is in desperate need of dualling so is very slowly undergoing it causing great disruption in the process. By the time the lot is done, it will probably have cost twice as much or more as if they're just done it on day one. The same kind of thing is being planned now whereby the A350 at West Ashton will be by-passed, but not the Yarnbrook roundabout that causes just as much of a problem. It's all got an extremely narrow and short term focus to it and everything is compromised.

No-one is held to account over the quality of repairs because with most roads being the councils' responsibilities, we do not really give enough support to our councillors so they can apply the appropriate pressure to see that the contractors are held to account. Of course, the whole neo-liberalist ideal of combining the private and public sectors in such a manner is a nonsense itself, and simply inflates prices. Many, or indeed most, of the recent jobs around here should never have been signed off IMO, but the council needs only to tick its box, and then anyone who complains is shouted down as a moaning old fart or a dangerous speed freak.

 Visiting from DISCO3.CO.UK
Discovery 3 TDV6 Auto HSE Zambezi Silver


Last edited by Lost for Words on 10th May 2016 8:11am. Edited 1 time in total

Lost for Words, you'd get my vote every time...

" Shine on you crazy diamond "

 The best 4.4 x far

Hopefully I won't go the way Syd did though! Visiting from DISCO3.CO.UK
Discovery 3 TDV6 Auto HSE Zambezi Silver