Revealed: Wolverhampton council pothole bill hits £11 million

A total of £11,512,580 was spent fixing potholes on Wolverhampton's roads over the period, including £8,424,250 on resurfacing and £3,088,330 on surface treatment.

Last year's figure of £2,428,330 marked the highest spend in the city's history, with an average spend per pothole of £569.

The figures, which were provided via a Freedom of Information request, show that in 2013/14 £2,480,000 was spent, while the previous year the total was £2,708,000. The two-year period from 2010 to 2012 saw £3,896,250 spent on repairs.

The council operates a 'first time fix' policy on potholes, where defects are permanently fixed first time in an effort to prevent further costly repair work.

Councillor Steve Evans, cabinet member for city environment services, said: "We aim to repair potholes within 24 hours on main roads.

"We have got limited budgets but we tackle the problem as best as we can. We respond to every concern that is raised as quickly as possible, I think we've got a pretty good track record. The guys are out there seven days a week responding to those complaints."

From June 2014 to May 2015 a total of 4,268 potholes were repaired in Wolverhampton, all of them within one working day of being reported.

But the city still has almost 45 miles of roads that bosses consider to be in need of maintenance work due to uneven surfaces or potholes.

The authority prioritises potholes that are considered so serious that they pose a threat to roads collapsing.

Over the last year all 97 so-called 'Category 1A' potholes that were reported were repaired within two hours.

The data also shows that in the last three years the council paid out £9,594 to drivers who had claimed compensation for damage to their vehicles caused by uneven road surfaces.

The authority received 199 claims for compensation over the period.

The city's pothole capital was Wobaston Road in 2014/15, which saw seven claims paid out for damage to vehicles last year alone.

In 2013/14 there were four claims made by drivers who suffered damage to their vehicles on Cannock Road, while the previous year there were six claims on Gorsebrook Road.

During 2014, the city council was awarded a cash windfall of £500,000 to fix thousands of potholes as part of a total £6.6 million potholes cashpot, shared with other Black Country and Staffordshire authorities.

At the time Prime Minister David Cameron described Wolverhampton as 'one of the leading areas in the country' in its determination to beat potholes.