RESURFACING on a key route in Midsomer Norton has been completed as part of 25 road improvement schemes across Bath and North East Somerset.

Almost 15km of roads were brought back up to a high standard with more than 103,000 sq m of road resurfaced and 5,149 pot holes repaired, an average of 19 a day.

Key schemes included Englishcombe Lane in Southdown, Combe Park in Weston and Chilcompton Road in Midsomer Norton. The largest scheme in the programme was Charlton Road in Keynsham, where more than 15,000 sq m of highway was resurfaced.

Working with VolkerHighways and other contractors, the council completed all its road resurfacing schemes between March and September, alongside programmes of highway patching, surface dressing and footway repairs.

This is on top of a Somerset Council programme partnering up with contractor Kiely Brothers, which saw ‘multipatcher’ technology be utilised to more effectively carry out a range of highway services.

This is a vehicle and a device that can carry out small scale surface dressing works, but also quickly and efficiently repair a range of other defects with just a driver and small team managing traffic.

Winter weather makes it more difficult to resurface highways to a high standard, so the council carries out the majority of its works in the warmer, drier months of the year.

Councillor Manda Rigby, cabinet member for highways, said: “Maintaining our highway network is an ongoing challenge but each year we get out and improve large areas across Bath & North East Somerset.

“As always, we now move on to planning next year’s programme and prioritising which highways will need to be worked on first. Our inspectors will be monitoring the impact the weather has on our network daily and their feedback will help shape next year’s programme.”

The council’s patching programme, which involves smaller resurfacing schemes, has also been completed and has resurfaced 42,000 sq m of highway at 25 locations. A programme of footway resurfacing is still ongoing and once complete will see 9,130 sq m of footway resurfaced at 22 locations.

To determine which roads will be included on next year’s programme, the council will look at highways that provide key links to services like schools and hospitals, the volume of vehicle and cycle traffic a highway receives, feedback from condition surveys, site inspections by Highway Inspectors as well as resident reports on FixMyStreet.