Published: Thursday, 23rd Mar 2023

A £12m pothole repair programme has fixed more than 400 Bolton streets, over and above the council’s existing annual maintenance work.

Set up in 2019, the scheme set aside £12m to deliver additional repairs on smaller residential streets across the borough.

In order to meet the key priorities of local residents, each ward was allocated £600,000 and councillors were asked to list the roads in their area that were in most need of fixing.

With an original list of 270 streets, the programme has since exceeded its targets and 422 roads have been repaired as of March 2023.

The work has been done alongside several additional smaller repair and patching jobs.

Following the success of the scheme, an additional £1m has been set aside for further work with each ward set to receive £50,000.

The original £12m was identified in 2019 as extra funding targeted specifically at smaller residential roads in the borough.

It is in addition to the council’s regular road maintenance budget which mainly focuses on major roads with the highest volume of traffic.

In the last year alone, the council has repaired over 6,300 individual defects and undertaken over 25 miles of carriageway repairs, including resurfacing works.

Bolton Council Leader, Cllr Martyn Cox, said:

“We know from speaking to local people that pothole repair is a top priority for our residents and for businesses.

“Since 2019, our highways teams have gone above and beyond to complete £12m of additional repairs on more than 400 roads that were often overlooked for maintenance.

“A key part of the repair scheme was engaging directly with communities to ensure the funding was used where it was needed most.

“As a council, we will continue to prioritise the issues that Bolton cares about most.”