£11m spent surface dressing 151km of Shropshire roads in major pothole prevention programme

More than £11m of Government funding has been spent surface dressing 151km of Shropshire’s roads since June 2020, to improve the county’s highways and help prevent potholes and other defects forming in the future.

That means that 875,000 square metres of road have been treated in time for winter.

Steve Davenport, Shropshire Council’s Cabinet member for highways and transport, said:

“In June the Department for Transport notified us that Shropshire would receive £11.4 million for investment in highway maintenance.

“We agreed to target this money at cost-effective, preventative maintenance work to ensure the maximum return on the investment – and agreed a surface dressing programme was the best use of the money.

“In total 82 sites – totalling 151km of carriageway – were identified for surface dressing. This equated to a surface area of 875,000 square metres and resulted in us delivering a programme three times bigger than our average annual surface dressing programme.

“This work was implemented rapidly and began on site within just three weeks of identifying the sites.

“The DfT specified that the money had to be spent by March 2021 so this required a major effort from all three of the partners in the Shropshire Highways Alliance – Shropshire Council, WSP and Kier – to mobilise a major programme of work to ensure this funding was not lost.”

A short video about the work

Surface dressing prolongs the structural integrity of the existing highway and prevents potholes and premature degradation. It is best applied before large defects begin to form in the structure of the road, and its primary function isto seal the road and prevent surface water ingress, the main cause of potholes.

In addition, surface dressing also re-textures the road providing better skid resistance creating a safer running surface.