A LOCAL authority highways boss has explained why some potholes in a borough's roads and pavements are repaired and others are not.
Blackburn with Darwen's executive member for growth, Cllr Quesir Mahmood, has launched a campaign to inform residents about the criteria for patching road defects.
He said potholes were one of the biggest sources of complaints to the authority and admitted that almost 500 of those reported last year failed to meet the minimum depth for repair.
Cllr Mahmood said that on footways a pothole needs to be 25 millimetres deep - the same depth as a two-pence coin to be repaired while on a road it needs to be the same depth as a golf ball, 40mm.
He said if a pothole is more than 150mm deep, it will be classed as an emergency and made safe by the next working day - often within two hours of the inspection.
Cllr Mahmood said that last year more than 6,700 potholes were repaired in Blackburn with Darwen.
He explained that reported potholes are inspected within 10 working days and where necessary repaired individually until the road can be resurfaced.
Cllr Mahmood revealed that the council carries out its own checks of busy town centre footways every month with major roads being reviewed every three months. All roads in the borough are checked at least once a year.
Cllr Mahmood said: ""We’re just as frustrated as our residents with the state of some of our roads.
"Currently, the council only receives enough funding to re-surface the equivalent of just 1.2 per cent, or just six kilometres, of roads each year.
"This means that it would take at least 85 years to re-surface all roads when the average road lasts around 20 years.
"As ward councillors we are inundated with complaints about potholes and the council’s highways team are too.
"We do want to help, but it’s incredibly difficult with the funds available.
"We want to highlight the position we’re in and ask residents for their help in identifying the depths of possible potholes before they report them.
"We had officers inspect almost 500 last year that sadly didn’t meet the criteria to be repaired – that’s a lot of time and money that could be better re-focused.
"As part of the campaign, we’re trying to make it easier for residents to know what is and isn’t a pothole as we rely on them to be vigilant and report issues.
"We will continue to lobby government to secure additional funding."
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