DELEGATED ITEM 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME Report to the Executive Director, Economy, Place and Skills and Cabinet Member for Regeneration and Environment 21 July 2010 Officer Contact: Carol Brown Ext. 4452 Purpose of Report The purpose of this report is to seek approval for £10 million of Prudential borrowing to significantly improve the condition of the highway network. Resurfacing and reconstruction works will be carried out over a 4 year period starting with work on site in November 2010. Members are requested to identify the priorities over the 4 year programme. Executive Summary This report provides details of the works proposed to be undertaken utilising the £10 million of prudential borrowing. This will result in the network being brought up to the AGMA average and reduce the backlog by 25%. A list of the roads classified as Red and Amber is given and Members are requested to consider the priorities over the 4 year programme. Recommendations It is recommended that:- a) The prudential bid of £10m over 4 years is approved; b) The Leadership Group identify the priorities over the 4 year programme for classified roads; Page 1 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 c) Funding is delegated to the District Partnerships, by the allocation of £25,000 per ward from 2010/11, for the purpose of allocating spend to unclassified roads classed as red and amber. The priorities as identified by each District Partnership to be fed into the annual programme, and d) It is noted that that all works will be carried out either by the Economy, Place and Skills Directorate’s internal Highways Services Operations team or appointed term contractors using the new minor highways contract 2009-2012 or by contractors appointed following a tendering process, in accordance with the Council’s contract procedure rules. Page 2 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 EXECUTIVE DECISION RECORDING SYSTEM REFERENCE NO: 10080004 DELEGATED ITEM 4 YEAR HIGHWAY RESURFACING INVESTMENT PROGRAMME Report to the Executive Director, Economy, Place and Skills and Cabinet Member for Regeneration and Environment Portfolio Responsibility: Regeneration and Environment 1 Purpose of Report 1.1 The purpose of this report is to seek approval for £10 million of Prudential borrowing to significantly improve the condition of the highway network. Resurfacing and reconstruction works will be carried out over a 4 year period starting with work on site in November 2010. Members are requested to identify the priorities over the 4 year programme. 2 Executive Summary 2.1 This report provides details of the works proposed to be undertaken utilising the £10 million of prudential borrowing. This will result in the network being brought up to the AGMA average and reduce the backlog by 25%. A list of the roads classified as Red and Amber is given and Members are requested to consider the priorities over the 4 year programme. 3.0 Recommendations It is recommended that:- a) The prudential bid of £10m over 4 years is approved; b) The Leadership Group identify the priorities over the 4 year programme for classified roads; c) Funding is delegated to the District Partnerships, by the allocation of £25,000 per ward from 2010/11, for the purpose of allocating spend to unclassified roads classed as red and amber. The priorities as identified by each District Partnership to be fed into the annual programme, and d) It is noted that all works will be carried out either by the Economy, Place and Skills Directorate’s internal Highways Services Operations team or appointed term contractors using the new minor highways contract 2009-2012 or by contractors appointed following a tendering process, in accordance with the Council’s contract procedure rules. Page 3 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 4 Background 4.1 Over the last 30 years, investment in highway resurfacing and reconstruction has fallen to £1.3 million per annum under LTP (2). It is expected that no additional funding will result from the new LTP (3) which is due to start in April 2011 i.e. it will remain same at level £1.3 million 4.2 Due to revenue budgeting constraints there will be no spend allocated to highway structural maintenance in this financial year. 4.3 In 2007 Highways Services produced their first 5 year Transport asset management plan which includes all the highway related assets. This indicates an asset value of the highway network of circa £1billion. 4.4 Highway Services manage the 814 km of adopted highway which includes Classified Roads A class roads111km B class roads 33 km C class roads 34km Unclassified network 636km the authority also has 108km of back streets which are rear very narrow passages 4.5 The Authority is currently spending £1.7 million out of the Revenue maintenance budget on highway claims, emanating from slips, trips and falls, and pothole and carriageway defects. There was a significant increase in the number of claims following last winter. 4.6 The increased amount of damage to the network was also demonstrated with an increase in the number of pothole gangs to 6 to deal with volumes being reported earlier this year. Whilst this has been subsequently reduced to 2 gangs we are now experiencing a 2 day backlog. The original budget for potholing provides for 1 gang and whilst provision has been made available for 2 there is insufficient budget available to increase this over a sustained period. 4.7 The current revenue budget is now only sufficient to provide reactive and cyclic maintenance i.e. street lighting, potholing, gully cleansing, repairs requiring 7 day repair or less (Category 1 Safety Inspection Repairs) and winter maintenance. There is no funding for planned maintenance. 4.8 The programme of works has various links to the Corporate Plan (2009-2013) objectives and priorities. Improvements to the built environment. The main ones are listed below: Confident Place Priority 1.1: Safer Oldham Confident Place: Priority 1.2: Cleaner and greener Oldham Address of Choice Priority 3:3 Improving local amenities Services of Choice Priority 4.1: Accessible and responsive services Page 4 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 Services of Choice Priority 4.3: One place approach to service delivery 5 Current Position 5.1 The resurfacing of A Classified Roads supports the reduction of NI 168. Highway work on B and C, Classified Roads supports in the reduction of NI 169. The use of NI’s in this report is to provide a benchmarked position. TABLE 1 National Description Indicator NI 168 Percentage of principal roads that need repair that are A Class. NI 169 Percentage of non-principal roads requiring repair that are B and C Class highways. Local (Bv224b) Percentage of unclassified roads requiring repair. Local Percentage of (Category 1 and 2) footways requiring repair. Local Number of days required to repair a fault on the networks by OMBC on a street lighting column. Local Number of days required to repair a fault on the network that affects street lighting columns by the Distribution Network Operator (United Utilities Ltd). TABLE 2 below shows the national indicators and new local indicators. The figures indicate the percentage of carriageway that requires repair, classified as ‘red’ on a RAG Scale. The higher the figure the worse the condition. Performance Indicator NI NI NI 2007/08 2008/09 2009/2010 NI 168 10.8% 8% 8% NI 169 9% 7.8% 7% Local Unclassified 17% 21% 23% Local Footway Cat 1 & 2 35% 35% 34% With a capital allocation of only £1.3m to spend, we previously spent a further £1million from revenue but see paragraph 4.7, on the network the National indicators (red roads) remain steady and are now not improving, whilst unclassified roads are steadily deteriorating. More worrying is the condition of the roads that are currently not “red” but approaching that condition; those classed as “amber” which are deteriorating at a rate of 4% per annum. With this in mind and to make significant improvements in the condition of the network, additional investment will be required. Page 5 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 In terms of value for money the indicators show Oldham to be below average cost (Chart 1) in terms of investment. Whilst Table 3 and Chart 2 show Oldham’s current performance to be at or below average compared to other Metropolitan Councils. CHART 1 Revenue Cost Comparison 2007/8 Charts 2 and 3 indicate the condition against spend. Below the line indicates Value for money. In both cases Oldham demonstrates value for money. Chart 2 - NI168 – Percentage of A roads where maintenance should be considered plotted against £’s spent / head of population Highwys VFM Comparison - Met Councils 2007/08 70 60 50 40 30 £'s/head spent 20 10 0 Average (median) Calderdale Doncaster Kirklees Knowsley Liverpool Newcastle Oldham Rochdale Sunderland Wirral value Series1 38.04 43.54 30.24 36.93 58.06 43.14 49.71 34.73 42.23 56.31 19.81 Series2 11 6 2 4 1 10 6 11 10 2 4 % of A roads where maintenance should be considered Page 6 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 Chart 3 - NI 169 - Percentage of B and C roads where maintenance should be considered plotted against £’s spent / head of population Highways VFM Comparison - Met Councils 2007/08 70 60 50 40 30 £'s/head spent £'s/head 20 10 0 Average Calderdal Sunderlan Wolverha (median) Coventry Doncaster Kirklees Knowsley Liverpool Oldham Sandwell Stockport Wirral e d mpton value Series1 38.04 43.54 26.09 30.24 36.93 58.06 43.14 34.73 27.81 42.57 56.31 19.81 31.52 Series2 14.5 11 19 4 7 2 13 12 4 5 3 3 2 % of B & C Roads where maintenance should be considered Page 7 of 38 2403 4 YEAR HIGHWAY INVESTMENT PROGRAMME JULY 2010 6 Options/Alternatives 6.1 Option 1- Do Nothing One option is to do nothing which would mean the 4% deterioration of the network would continue even with the spend of £1.3 million DfT capital LTP monies (on average over the last 3 years).