Safety pledge as £6.6 million spent on roads revamp in Walsall
Millions of pounds have been spent on maintaining Walsall's roads in just one year, figures have revealed.
More than £6.6 million has been forked out on highway maintenance schemes since August.
A total of 47 roads have been resurfaced – a total length of 16km of carriageway, along with 8.6km of foot-way.
Preventative work, to ensure potholes do not form, have been carried out on 28 roads over a length of 7km – at a cost of £450,000 to Walsall Council.
Other work on 45 footways, over a length of 19km, cost the council £250,000.
And more than 3,700 potholes have also been repaired over the same period.
Walsall Council leader Mike Bird said it was an "ongoing" battle to keep the roads up to standard in the borough.
He said: "I'm a firm believer that if the roads are repaired, constituents or residents tend to be quite happy.
"Any elected member would say the main complaints we receive is either potholes or bins and people judge administrations on whether the roads are repaired or not.
"This time of the year and during the school holidays is when we do a lot of our work.
"It's an ongoing battle to keep on top of the roads in order to keep them safe.
"Parts of the borough and less good than we would like – we could do with millions of pounds extra to fix them as most local authorities would agree."
The authority is now using Velocity Patching in a bid to tackle the issue of potholes within the area.
"We've got a new system which we use, it's a machine which blows tarmac into holes which creates a patch instead of having to damp it down and into the hole," Mr Bird said.
"It's forced by way of pressure, which gives it a longer life."
