3.3 Highways Maintenance in the First Local Transport Plan
Lancashire was allocated £78.795m by the Department for Transport for capital highways maintenance during the plan period. In addition Lancashire was allocated £4.365 million for capital works on de-trunked roads giving a total allocation of £83.16 million for the five year period. We have spent a total of £87.358 million, an increase of £4.198 million(5% increase).
Lancashire’s Capital Programme is managed on a corporate basis and it is not possible to equate areas of income directly to spending. Additional funding through partner contributions and grants have played a large part in increasing the total programme level and some of the benefits have been used to deliver this significant increase in funding.
Highway maintenance funding is still a main concern of this authority. The lack of funds is now seriously compromising the works programme and many years of good highway maintenance and stewardship are being sacrificed by low investment. Problems continue to mount which appear not to be reflected in the current BVP indicators.
Figure 3.5 Condition of Principal Roads
3.3.1 Principal roads
Condition of the network in 2005/06; 5% of roads in need of repair based on Scanner surveys (BV 223). This meets the DfT’s benchmark of 12% for good condition.
Change in the state of the network
The Deflectograph data set shows a continuing decline in condition of Principal Roads at a rate of 2.2% per annum. This is a remarkably linear decline despite spending in excess of both revenue and capital indicative allocations. There are several reasons for this decline.
The lengths of Principal Motorway within the county continue to place enormous pressure on both revenue and capital funds. Motorways are a unique, hostile environment in terms of their use and of course their maintenance and are very expensive to maintain. Despite their importance in the road hierarchy, there does not appear to be a clearly identified mechanism to bid for county motorway maintenance capital funding, presumably because there is so little Principal motorway nationally. Currently, all major Principal Motorway repairs are funded from the Principal Roads capital allocation. This seems inappropriate considering that road condition data for motorways in Lancashire, quite rightly, has never been included in the Principal Roads performance indicators. Principal Motorways and Principal Roads are entirely different classes of road and should be treated as such.
It has been during the period of LTP1 that this discrepancy has become a more pressing issue. Most of the Principal Motorway network is now 20 to 25 years old and therefore structural repairs have become necessary. Attempting to fund Principal Motorways and Principal Roads maintenance out of the Principal Roads allocation will become an increasingly difficult situation to manage during LTP2 unless a funding solution can be found.
Cost inflation; The rise in engineering costs, particularly labour, bitumen based products and fuels, during the period of the plan, of 32.5% is significantly higher than general inflation leading to a reduction in the amount of work carried out.
The A road network carries huge volumes of traffic including a significant proportion of HGVs and so information about the strength of these roads is vitally important. With this in mind, Lancashire has carried out Deflectograph surveys for many years and plans to continue for the foreseeable future. This data set was chosen for BVPI 96. It covers a longer period than other road condition data sets and has been stable in terms of data collection and analysis during that period. Therefore, it is more than just a good measure of the strength of the road but it is also a reliable indicator of year on year change in condition.
The last two years have seen the introduction of first TTS and then Scanner. There is no correlation between these two surveys types because of changes in the specification, analysis and reporting method, and no correlation with Deflectograph data. Prior to TTS/Scanner, the A Road network was latterly bottom quartile based on Deflectograph data (BV 96). Based on TTS data, the national comparison placed the A road network above average. This highlights the difficulty in determining the most appropriate management strategy for classified roads. We continue to believe that road strength data is an essential part of the development of resurfacing programme and also that this factor must be built into the funding formulae for Principal Roads.
Figure 3.6 Condition of Non-Principal Classified Roads
3.3.2 Non-principal classified roads
Condition of the network in 2005/06: 8% of roads in need of repair based on Scanner surveys (BV 224a). This meets DfT’s benchmark of 12% for good condition
Change in the state of the network
Course Visual Inspection (CVI) survey results show that the condition of the network deteriorated in 04/05 following a period of improvement. The 05/06 Scanner result of 8%, although not directly comparable with CVI results, is virtually the same as 04/05, suggesting some stability in the condition of the network. However, the 05/06 performance indicator report revealed a very high value for the “amber” figure of 30%. There is concern about the rate at which “amber” roads will become “red” roads in the next few years. Spending on the non-principal road network has been a reasonably consistent proportion of the “Other roads” capital funding, possibly at the expense of unclassified roads and footways. This may account for the relative stability of this part of the network compared with the other classes that show a pattern of decline.
Figure 3.7 Condition of Unclassified Roads
3.3.3 Un-classified roads
Condition of the network in 2005/06: 7.8% of roads in need of repair based on CVI surveys (BV 224b). This meets DfT’s benchmark of 12% for good condition
Change in the state of the network
The un-classified road PI data set is one of only two that have a degree of continuity, the other being Principal Roads Deflectograph. There is a similar pattern of decline shown in both data sets of around 2% pa. A welcome improvement in condition of un-classified roads during 05/06 flattened the previous trend of decline of 3.4%. The fact that results each year are based on 25% of the network does introduce the possibility of unrepresentative values which is why trending of results is important. However, a comparison between the 05/06 value of 7.8% and the equivalent 25% of the network first surveyed in 01/02 with a value of 2.1% reveals a decline of 5.7%. Whilst this is less than the trend line of decline suggests, it is a valid measure of the decline of the same part of the network. This gives an annual decline of 1.4% pa.
Figure 3.8 Condition of Footways
3.3.4 Footways
We have concentrated investment on our roads. Even so, we have not been able to prevent an overall decline in condition. Only limited funds have remained available for footway maintenance. The survey of the network in 2005/06 by Detailed Visual Inspection(DVI) (BVI187) showed that 58% of footways are in need of repair. This is far greater than the DfT’s benchmark of 12% for good condition. The result of 58% is based on a survey of half of the footway network designated as 'busy footways'. Whilst this may not represent the state of the whole network, it does indicate the urgent need for greater investment.
3.3.5 Maintenance Of Highway Structures
The total expenditure on Bridge Maintenance, Assessment and Strengthening in 2001/02 –2005/06 has been £27.485 million .
Good progress has been made over the duration of this LTP in strengthening 243 substandard bridges and 12209 metres of substandard retaining walls. This included 7 joint schemes with Network Rail in order to improve access to rural communities.
Progress on assessment of bridges has continued and work has begun on the assessment of retaining walls. However, resources have been diverted recently from assessments in order to carry out urgent strengthening work on bridges because this provides greater benefit to the travelling public. Now that this work has been done it is planned to complete the assessment of bridges and to make a significant inroad into the assessment of retaining walls in 2007/08. It is intended, as part of this work, to commit significant resources to improve the information held in our Bridge Management System to assist in the progression and implementation of the Council’s Transport Asset Management Plan based on the framework developed by CSS/TAG.
3.3.6 Progress towards Targets and Objectives
LNLT 1601- Number of Bridges needing Assessment
Progress on assessment of bridges has not been as good as predicted in LTP 1. This is mainly due to delays in completing the assessment of private bridges owned by Network Rail and British Rail Property Board caused by the national shortage of bridge engineers and the need for more refined assessments. However carrying out more refined assessments is resulting in the need to strengthen fewer bridges with overall benefits to the programme. Additionally, a further 18 bridges were identified which required assessment. However the assessment programme is substantially complete and all parties are co-operating to complete the outstanding work.
LNLT 1602 - Number of Substandard Bridges needing Strengthening
Good progress has been made in strengthening substandard bridges and as a result the strengthening programme is on track. This work has included joint schemes with Network Rail in order to improve access to rural communities in the county and to assist in the regeneration of urban areas.
In this LTP, priority was given to the strengthening of substandard bridges. However, in LTP 2, the work necessary to bring the substandard bridges up to full capacity must be added to the structures work-bank and value managed alongside all other maintenance work. As a result of the expected change in the priority of strengthening work, it may be necessary to consider making interim measures permanent as an alternative to strengthening. This will be implemented where the social environmental and economic consequences are considered acceptable in order to release funds for maintenance works. This change will improve the overall condition of the structure stock and help to achieve the County Council’s target BSCI in a shorter timescale.
LNLT 1603 - Average Value of Condition Indicator for all Bridges
Generally the target for the average condition indicator is not on track largely because resources available for bridge maintenance have been below the level to reduce the backlog of maintenance work and hence below the level to meet this ambitious target.
The continuous decline in condition from 1992 onwards had halted in 2003/04 due to higher allocations between 1998/99 and 2006/07 (with the exception of 2003/04). The condition indicator has now started to increase and the implementation of a value management process is expected to release funds from strengthening works to maintenance works (as proposed in LTP 2). It is anticipated that savings from this process would continue to address the maintenance backlog leading to further increases in the condition indicator (which is now reported on using the criteria from the CSS system and can be converted back to the Lancashire Condition indicator.).
LNLT 1604 – Proportion of Retaining Walls Assessed
This indicator is considered to be on track to meet the LTP 1 target of 32% of assessments completed by 2015/16. The indicator was not forecast to increase in a linear manner as, during the early years of the programme, resources were targeted at bridge assessments and strengthening. From 2008 it is planned to increase the resources used for assessment and strengthening of retaining walls.
LNLT 1605 - Retaining Walls Strengthened
This indicator is related to LNLT 1604 for the assessment of retaining walls, to identify the structures needing strengthening and the forecast progress on strengthening work. The indicator is on track to meet the target. It is anticipated that there will be a growth in the length requiring strengthening as walls are assessed and then a reduction as resources become available for works. As in LNLT 1604 it is planned to increase the resources used for retaining wall strengthening, however, strengthening works will be subject to the value management process described in LNLT 1602 and 1603 above.