The provisional carriageway and footpath resurfacing programme for the next financial year has been agreed by the Council.

It continues the 60% cut in maintenance expenditure introduced by Labour when they took over the running of the Council.

The draft programme is agreed at this time of year to allow officials to plan a work programme. It follows inspections undertaken in the summer which tabulate the condition of each road. Ward Councillors have the opportunity to put forward roads for consideration for repair.

The list reveals that some wards like Derwent (Dunnington) and Heslington will not get ANY repairs next year while the largest ward (Westfield) will see only a small part of the Foxwood Lane footpath resurfaced. It means that roads that are breaking up (such as Vesper Drive) will continue to deteriorate.

Residents will hope that more money will be found for road maintenance when the Council meets in February to agree its final budget. If it doesn’t then the backlog of works will grow to the point where it becomes impossible to maintain safe surfaces catering for the needs of all road users.

Cyclists in particular are vulnerable to potholes and this may be a factor contributing to accident numbers which are beginning to creep up again in York.