SINCE the ‘Beast from the East’ hit Surrey and Hampshire in March, the focus has turned to the damage it caused to roads, specifically to the potholes it has created.

According to the website Fill That Hole, more potholes have been reported in surrey than anywhere else in the country – 8,374, with 7,160 of them still to be be fixed.

Hampshire has the second largest number in Great Britain at 4,490, only 869 of which have been fixed, and the problem has been exacerbated by the recent cold weather.

Following the cold snap, Surrey County Council announced an extra £5million was going to be invested into the county’s roads.

Colin Kemp, cabinet member for highways, said where the roads have been severely damaged by the winter weather the council was “doing a complete resurfacing job” rather than simply putting patches.

But Stephen Cooksey, the Liberal Democrat spokesman for highways, criticised the level of council spending, saying it would take more than £750million to repair Surrey’s roads and footways to an ‘as new’ standard, and at the current rate of spending, it would take almost 50 years to complete this work.

Mr Cooksey said: “The fact Surrey’s roads and footways are in such a dreadful condition is not news to our residents who have to drive over many potholes every day.

“That £754million of spending is needed to bring them up to a decent standard is quite shocking, and only highlights the inadequacy of the county council’s recently announced £5million of additional funding for road repairs, which is a drop in the ocean.

“The county council could do more to prioritise funding for improving the condition of roads and footways.

“It is currently spending millions of pounds purchasing commercial property outside the county, which could be used for resurfacing roads here in Surrey.

“This investment in resurfacing would save money on costly future repairs.

But Mr Kemp said the council had not received enough funding from central government.

He said: “Surrey has some of the busiest roads in the country and they are underfunded.

“Funding is worked out on the length of road not on how busy they are. We are still campaigning with the Government to get fairer finding for Surrey’s roads.”

Mr Kemp recently took to Facebook to share a traffic light system used by the council to assess the amount of time the county has to deal with the different craters.

Potholes distinguished as being in the ‘red’ category must be ‘made safe’within two hours as they are ‘likely to result in serious or fatal consequences’.

Those marked as ‘amber’ or ‘medium risk’ must be ‘made safe’ or repaired within five working days and must have a ‘defect greater than 40mm in depth and 150mm in diameter”’.

A pothole colour-coded yellow is considered low risk and should be repaired within 20 working days.

A green-coded pothole is one that ‘may be unpleasing to the eye but not considered a safety issue’.

nAround £3million has been allocated by the Government toward Hampshire County Council’s pothole fund. But while welcoming the one-off funding from a national pot of around £100million, the council is calling for a long-term solution to tackle the problem of Hampshire’s deteriorating roads.

Rob Humby, Hampshire’s executive member for environment and transport, said: “We welcome the news the Government has recognised the damage caused to local roads by the recent severe weather.

“However, with our budgets already under pressure, we estimate we would need around three times as much as we have been allocated to restore the roads to the condition they were in before the snow and ice  – and, following years of reduced council funding and rising demand, that was far from ideal.”

He added: “For some years in Hampshire we have taken the asset-management approach now promoted by the Government, using money for highways maintenance in the most effective and efficient way.

“We’ve had to put an extra £10million each year from local money to do this, making the roads more resilient to the impact of severe weather.

“We know what we’re doing is working well because the roads we have managed in this way are in good condition and we compare well to other areas of a similar size, but £10million only goes so far. 

“We have around 5,500 miles of roads all bearing the brunt of heavy traffic and cold and wet winters.”

Mr Humby added: “One-off funding is welcome but it’s not going to solve the long-term problem of deteriorating local roads.

“As long as the Government continues to prioritise funding for motorways and trunk roads looked after by Highways England at the expense of the local network looked after by councils, then the roads and footways which people use every day in their cars, on buses, on bikes or on foot will continue to decline.”

West Sussex has 3,044 reported potholes, putting it at No. 10 in the league table. But 27 per cent of them are reported as fixed.

Bob Lanzer, West Sussex County Council cabinet member for highways and infrastructure, said: “The recent wet weather and variations between mild and cold/freezing temperatures have resulted in more potholes being reported to the council.

“Please bear with our staff and contractors, who are working hard to get the worst of these repaired as soon as possible.”