Councillor Update

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2016

District Six: West Wight

District Steward: Derek Bean

District 6 map showing the different road hierarchies

During January and February, Island Roads will be carrying out the following work in your district area:

Network management

Throughout January and February the network management teams will be continuing their year- round programme of maintenance work, highway inspections and surveys to monitor and respond to issues on the network including potholes and other defects and repairs, overhanging branches and other safety matters. This will include 193 walked highway safety inspections and 539 driven highway safety inspections in your district area.

We are also continuing our programme of testing the reflectivity of signs to ensure they have the right level of visibility for road users. We use a specialist hand-held device to do this; called a retro- reflectometer. Those that do not reach the required data levels will be replaced.

At the end of last year we launched an important campaign, together with the Council and the Environment Agency, to help make the community aware of their responsibilities when it comes to reducing highway flooding. Our joint ‘Ditch it’ campaign was widely publicised in leaflets, advertisements (in the County Press, IW Beacon and on IW Radio) and on the council’s, Environment Agency and our own website. We also met with members of the NFU and information was distributed to their membership via their newsletter. It is an important message and our district stewards will be continuing to talk to the community and distributing information to ensure people are aware of the need to keep ditches clear and property and land adequately drained to help prevent highway flooding. You can find out more and download a leaflet by visiting our website www.islandroads.com

Surfacing work – footways

During the winter months our carriageway surfacing work ceases but footway work, which is less affected by the weather, continues. The following schemes, totalling 11,286m2 will be completed by March 2016:

Road,  Main Road, Shalfleet  Colwell Road, Freshwater  Halletts Shute, Freshwater  Afton Road, Freshwater  Road,  Main Road, Thorley  Main Road, Newbridge  Heathfield Road, Freshwater  Copse Lane, Freshwater  Camp Road, Freshwater  Cliff Road,  Elliston Road, Totland  Fairfield Way, Totland  Golden Ridge Freshwater  Heatherwood Park Road, Totland  Linstone Drive, Yarmouth  Russell Road,  Westhill Lane, Yarmouth  Solent Hill, Freshwater  The Mount, Yarmouth  St Swithins Crescent, Shalfleet  Longhalves Lane, Freshwater  Summers Court, Totland  Sirenia Close, Brighstone  Lansdown Gardens,  Various alleyways and cycleways

We are also continuing our planning for the carriageway programme which will commence again in the spring. The 2016 programme will be the largest to date. We welcome any feedback from local members and town and parish councils on any roads that they feel are a priority within the local area and will consider these as part of our future programme planning. There are strict guidelines governing when and where we can work on the highway so any requests will be considered alongside this framework.

We are also continuing with our preparatory work ahead of resurfacing including ‘walk, talk, build’ assessments for each location (which help inform the final planning of the type and scope of works), designing schemes and undertaking enabling works (kerbing, hedge cutting, drainage etc) required that must be completed before the surfacing begins. Drainage schemes

We are continuing works, throughout January, to complete a major drainage scheme at Brighstone. Under the scheme, the old inadequate drainage system in North Street, Warnes Lane, Main Road and Broad Lane is being replaced with a system that will have greater capacity and also be more resilient to silting.

Operations and maintenance work

In addition to year-round works in each district such as bollard, street name plates and bench repairs fly tipping clearance, collection of dead animals from the network at this time of the year our teams are also involved in the supply of flood warning signs, maintaining sandbag stocks, dealing with fallen trees and undertaking mechanical sweeping to tackle leaf fall.

We are also undertaking gully and drainage cleansing, clearing silt traps to help prevent flooding and our flood response unit is on hand should it be required.

We have also invested in the latest machinery to try to ensure that we have the best products to tackle the Island’s roads in the winter and keep them safe for people driving out and about around the Island. We have also increased our stocks of salt to 1600 tonnes and our drivers are fully prepared ahead of the winter period. Decisions concerning when to despatch the salting lorries are informed by national and local data including daily Met Office reports providing information bespoke to the Island’s highways on a 24 hour basis. Two local weather stations - one at Duxmore on the Downs Road, providing readings at one of the highest points and one at , providing readings at one of the lowest points on the Island – also help inform a decision on whether to salt. This information is supplemented by on the ground visual inspections from Island Roads staff.

We are installing the last of our new lighting columns including specific styles for those in heritage and conservation areas. We expect to complete the replacement of all of the network lights by the end of January.

Wootton Bridge

We are carrying out works under a 14 week scheme, scheduled to complete in mid February, to strengthen Wootton Bridge following the discovery of structural cracking. The current speed and weight restrictions remain in place but works are progressing well and, once complete, we hope to restore the bridge to its original 40 tonne limit.

Voluntary work

We operate a volunteering scheme on the Island, whereby our staff receive two paid days leave each year to provide volunteering support and their skills to projects in the local community. Some examples have included ground clearance work at Northwood cemetery and Wroxall Scout Hut, beach litter picking, line painting a school netball court, clearing Himalayan Balsam, creating planters for a school play area and many more projects. If you have a community project in your area that you think could benefit from our support please get in touch via [email protected]

Supporting community projects in your area

You may have read about the latest round of grants that we have given to community projects as part of the Isle of Wight Foundation, a charitable trust set up by the partners in Island Roads. Each year we give around £80,000 of support in grants of between £3,000 and £16,000 each to community projects that help tackle social exclusion, either by providing support with training and qualifications or by bringing communities together on the Island. You can read more about the projects that have benefited from the last two years of grant funding and in February we will be launch the 2016 grant call. Please do encourage voluntary and not-for-profit community groups in your area to consider applying for funding. For more details visit our website http://www.islandroads.com/137-iw-foundation.html or contact us on 01983 822440.

Contacting Island Roads

For further information visit our website www.islandroads.com . Plus don’t forget we also have an interactive ‘Report it online’ facility where you can report any issues on the network and track your inquiry http://www.islandroads.com/23-report-it-online.html . Or you can call us on 01983 822440 or email us at [email protected].