Kent County Council has set out plans for £8.5m to be used to repair and resurface roads over the next two years.
The plans are funded through a £135m pot allocated to Kent for an11-year plan to improve local roads.
A nationwide programme of pothole repairs and road resurfacing projects, made possible by the first tranche of £8.3 billion in reallocated HS2 funding, has been revealed – with the first set of roads already having been resurfaced to make journeys by road safer, faster, and smoother.
As a condition of the funding, and to make sure money is being spent on pothole repairs, local authorities are required to have published two-year plans detailing exactly which local roads will benefit.
The pothole blitz began in March and runs into autumn this year.
For Thanet the roads (as of April 17) are:
| Road | Type of works | Surface area resurfaced (if applicable) m² | Status |
| Eastern Esplanade | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 1116 | Completed |
| Edge End Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 1483.34 | Completed |
| Green Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the assets and improving road condition | 541.3 | Planned works |
| Laundry Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the assets and improving road condition | 188 | Planned works |
| Manston Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the assets and improving road condition | 3333.12 | Planned works |
| Rosedale Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 706 | Completed |
| South Eastern Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 442.23 | Completed |
| Springfield Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 517.24 | Completed |
| Watchester Road | Permanent carriageway patching, adding life to the asset and improving ride quality and safety | 592.44 | Completed |
KCC’s Cabinet Member for Highways and Transport, Neil Baker said: “Between April and December 2023 we repaired 54,814 potholes and mended or resurfaced more than 416,991m2 of road, which is equivalent to 57 Wembley football pitches.
“Kent’s roads are among the busiest in the country, which is why throughout the winter we have been responding to reports of potholes by completing emergency repairs where defects present a risk to safety.
“With the weather improving we are turning our attention to completing permanent fixes the first time we visit the site, so the travelling public can be confident that repairs will last.”
South Thanet MP Craig Mackinlay said: “I know from speaking to people across Thanet how frustrating potholes and poor-quality roads can be.
“Whilst Labour are waging a war on motorists with blanket 20mph limits and a ban on road building in Wales and the ULEZ expansion in London to tax the poorest drivers off the road, as Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Fair Fuel I am on the side of hard-pressed drivers and want to do all I can to encourage government to help them.
“That is why I welcome this government funding to improve journeys for drivers across the country, funding road and pothole repairs, and committing £135m over the next ten years to improve roads across Kent, including those in Thanet.”
County Councillor Karen Constantine said: “As Ramsgate County Councillor I can confidently say potholes (closely followed by blocked drains) are the matters I receive most complaints about. I hope that this year’s blitz tackles the pothole problems thoroughly – as many residents have pointed out all too often the repair is temporary.
“I note in advance of local elections up and down the country the Conservatives are at long last heeding the plight of the cyclist, motorist, mobility scooters users and even those who push prams and pushchairs across our roads. They are rightly outraged by state of the local roads.
“Ramsgate residents will remember that when HS2, the high-speed rail project, was scrapped last year, we were promised that money would be diverted to deal with our lamentable roads. So far we are seeing a trickle.”
Report potholes at www.kent.gov.uk/potholes
Oh great and what about the hundreds of other roads in Thanet.While you are at it can existing roads be swept,weeded and silted drains unblocked.
Thankyou Tories for the years of neglect.
Ditto that Davo! £8.5 million a drop in the ocean, nowhere near enough. Most roads in Ramsgate anyway, would be unacceptable in 3rd world countries. Try going up Hereson Road from Ramsgate town on a mobility scooter!
I’ve had the potholes in my neighbourhood filled recently, but I agree with you totally Davo. The Torries are to blame for potholes, Brexit, Global Warming, Inflation, and The Fall of Rome.
Perhaps we can have a charity concert to address this that’s filled with local Rappers whose voices sound like Stephen Hawking with a garden sprinkler in the background.
To clear-up all doubt, I’m not being sarcastic whatsoever. Really. I mean that.
Typical Tory shambles, they have totally run down public services and under funded local councils, then after wasting millions on the planned Northern leg of the HS2 project, they cancel it and then spend what’s left over on the public services that they have decimated. The general election can’t come quick enough.
It doesn’t matter what government is in power, there simply is never going to be enough money in the Treasury’s coffers to do everything that everyone wants. Unless we have tax increases, cut back on benefits, don’t increase pensions and goodness knows how many other things – none of which will be popular with whoever is affected.
But a good first step would be to get more people back into employment and for the national economy to grow. Any ideas on how to do that?
Could scrap Trident, cut the armed forces budget to the European average, put VAT on aviation fuel, bring in a tourist level of £10 a head collected at the airport, remove charitable status from public schools, bring a tobin tax on stock exchange dealing, etc. Plenty of money if we are willing to collect it!
Just seen a Party Election Broadcast by the Tories on BBC1.They claim they are filling all pot holes.Thats a lie.
Also claimed our economy grew more than France last year.Well in my opinion France has the best roads in the World.Not a pothole in sight.Litter free as well.Oh and while we are cancelling the second High Speed Train,France has 26 which link every city.They enjoy 2 hour lunch breaks and some industries get August off as a holiday.Oh and my daughter who lives there saw a doctor the same day and was operated on in 2 weeks.
Why are Thanet tories spending £50 million on new roads on the north Thanet link when they can’t maintain the existing roads????
I must have missed Keir Starmer announcing a proposal for a blanket 20mph speed limit on all roads, thank you for enlightening me Mr Mackinlay. Oh and you’ll find the poorest Londoners are probably the ones on the bus, not the ones driving Land Rovers around the suburbs.
Once again its the Tories doing the posh areas where they live. For the record the St Peters Estate where we live has not had its roads resurfaced since it was built in 1954 and still has the bare concrete ones built when the houses and flats were. I contacted our KCC Councillor one Lesley Games about this but no response. Hopefully she will be voted out as Councillor at the next County Council elections. I use a mobility scooter and the roads (& pavements) resemble the battle of the Somme on bad Thursday. How about targeting the poorer areas for resurfacing and let Tunbridge Wells and Maidstone wait at the back of the queue for once!
It’s hard not to be cynical over this.Two weeks away from local elections and this is the best they can come up with.
An 11 year plan! My car will be scrap by then, brought on by being subject to constant thumping and banging when falling into the chasms they call potholes.Blitz does not mean eleven years it means immediately.France was not beaten at Sedan during WW2 by a German blitzkrieg over 11 years, they were beaten in weeks.
Mackinlay surfaces like a rusty old submarine and blathers on about ‘Labour’s war against the motorist’,when it is the bungling incompetence of underfunding local government for 14 years that is doing more harm to motorists than any alleged failure of ULEZ or 20 mph limits.
You can purchase a functioning ULEZ approved car for less than £2000.The people banging on about ULEZ are owners of clapped out 4WDs and Transits,not the poor who will be using public transport.
Buses get damaged by potholes and are also slowed up by them.
‘My car will be scrap by then’. How olds your car now? You need to buy a Toyota it will run and run. Probably outlive you.
It’s a Honda, more reliable than a Toyota but nothing will be reliable if potholes aren’t fixed Laurence.
I don’t think even you can defend this sort of Dumbo economics.
My point is calling a very modest repairs a ‘blitz’ is untrue and extremely overstated.
Thank you for your personal view that a Honda is more reliable than a Toyota. I think there is probably little between them but Toyota recently certainly has the edge.
As far as your comment ‘I don’t think even you can defend this sort of Dumbo economics’ Speaks volumes for your dismissive and condescending attitude about others you don’t agree with or who you think are politically right of centre. The neglect and underfunding of basic existing road infrastructure in this country has gone on for many years and stretches back into the 1990’s so stating the obvious as each year passes decay compounds itself.
Happy motoring in your Honda, we are very happy with our Toyota Aygo X which came second after a Suzuki Ignis just ahead of a Honda Jazz its place in the Which Consumer organisations most reliable cars for 2024.
A rather pathetic piece by MacKinley.
It’s a dozen years of tory austerity that has lead to the current dreadful situation on our roads.
I understood that 20 mph and ULEZ zones have been introduced to make streets safer, and the air cleaner. What’s MacKinley got against that?
Andrew – your ignorance shines brightly as usual. Good manners is free so I suggest to refer to MR MacKinley rather than using his surname. Regarding your comments on road’s situation, you think this situation has only occurred following Conservative Government? You do need to grow up and research matters before commenting.
Is this another joke? Sorry if i seem sceptical – i wonder why. Permanent fixes ? How to say it was a bodge without saying it was a bodge. Thanets roads are terrible & resurfacing Manston road was a joke too, apart from chips everywhere in the beginning it is rough. Tyre companies will be doing okay i guess.
Crescent Road Ramsgate could do with some work. 2 sink holes now on the road. All cordoned off but not a workman in sight.
Roads in Thanet and North Kent more widely are in a terrible state and the sticking plaster announcement 2 weeks before local elections is all too familiar and ultra cynical. Successive Tory governments have underfunded our national infrastructure and local authorities over 14 years and its high time we booted ineffective Tory Councillors and their terrible self serving MPs out of office at the earliest chance. McKinley blaming 20mph zones and ULEZ is just the usual deflecting argument so you don’t look at his own pathetic record and that of other MPs in the area ie sleepy Roger Gale and the awful Natalie Elphicke.
During the last few years the government has spent billions on benefits of one kind or another to help people who have suffered sickness, high gas etc, and help for Ukrainian war , and if we had not had brexit our payment to the eu would have doubled. So who ever is in power they going to be struggling to find the cash to improve everything . So think about what the other parties would have done, and what damage they will do in the next few years. I don’t think sticky Starmer or any of his sidekicks, especially rent a gob Rayner are upto the challenge. Now is the time for people to help out , do not litter, take a pride in your neighborhood , go to work, don’t have accidental children, visit elderly relatives, don’t go to A&E with a scratch or headache, start looking after yourself better. Not everything in life needs to be done by the government take charge of your own future. And if you don’t like this country go find another .
Oh dear!
We’re suffering the greatest tax burden since the Second World War. But the vast amount of money this government takes from us is conspicuous by its absence.
It’s certainly not being spent on hospitals, nurses, doctors, schools, teachers,publicc transport infrastructure, the armed forces.
So Where’s it all going?
At least, as we’ve left the EU, we are now £350,000,000 a week better off. … err …
Absolutely the money and more has gone into NHS. It’s just not being used ice . School teachers that I know all have time and money for cars , phones, computers nice houses and overseas holidays, police officers retire with a good pension, I’m sure there are loads of projects that benefit the country that go unmentioned. If Starmer and Co get in , lord help us, taxes will rise, benefits will rise and hard workers will get less, the unions will demand and get we will all be demanding a change of government in no time.
It’s going in higher debt charges, triple lock pensions,a non performing nuclear deterrent, failed projects, an increasing housing benefit bill, due to higher rents,bailing out the banks, COVID expenditure,crony capitalism, domestic energy support, and yes post Brexit outlays on capital and revenue.
How do we return to normalcy? Firstly,
embrace some of the green stuff and build a resilient green economy which increase well paid jobs and deliver a self sufficiency in cheap energy.
We could alter the taxation system a little so that the wealthy do pay their fair share,rather than bludging off the majority.
Finally, we could reduce the use of expensive service companies who do not perform and carry out service tasks like collecting rubbish and filling potholes in house,as was the custom before 1979. Some of these tasks such as pothole filling could be done by some of those immigrants that some here moan about, They would be performing a vital task,earn money,and stop being a drain on the economy.
Of course the racists and haters won’t approve,but who cares, it’s practically over discrimination.
What is this “war on motorists” that Mackinlay mentions? More 20mph zones ,more ULEZ areas and less road-building sound like excellent ideas. If there is a “war” it is against pedestrians and public-transport users (particularly bus-users) -not on car drivers. Actually, I don’t think the word “war” should be used at all in this context. It’s too exaggerated, and unnecessarily provocative.
Every time I filled in the details of a pot hole outside my house on the KCC website for reporting pot holes they were fixed and quite quickly so I wonder if people are reporting them if not they need to be reporting
George, ( no it all) I agree with you about triple lick pensions, but how else do we support pensioners, I know , let’s give them a living wage, say £400 a week or do we force them out of their inherited homes and make them live in one bedroom flats. No probably best to leave it as it is and educate the young in the ways of managing funds and savings for the future.
Now I await your next rant
( Know it Al)