Nottinghamshire County Council approve £1.75m to fill potholes
New machines that can quickly and more permanently fill potholes will be brought on to the roads in Nottinghamshire.
It is hoped the new techniques will stop potholes from having to be repeatedly filled.
Nottinghamshire County Council approved £1.75m for the project, with the hope the new machines will be operational by late summer.
It comes after a harsh winter last year meant 115,000 potholes had to be filled— which the council said led to concerns about the sustainability of the approach.
Mr Bruce Laughton, who represents Muskham and Farnsfield, and said: “At long last I can see light at the end of the pothole tunnel.
“It is about time we started looking at innovative ways of starting to deal with this issue.
“This investment is going to deal with this problem, and that’s a major positive.”
One of two new techniques highways workers will now be able to use is called spray injection chip patching.
First, a high-pressure blower will blast the area to get rid of dust and debris.
A sticky seal is then sprayed into the area, before new bitumen and aggregate is sprayed into the pothole.
Once that is done, the area around the defect is sprayed to leave a larger, square patch, which is designed to prevent the pothole opening up again in the future.
Dry aggregate is then sprayed on to the new patch, meaning cars can drive over the repair straight away.
Another new system, known as mechanised patching, will also be brought in to deal with more major and structural damage.
Mr John Cottee, chairman of the committee that approved the changes, said: “This will significantly improve productivity so that our highways teams can cover more than double their daily target repairs.
“It also allows relatively large areas of carriageway to be treated quickly, meaning teams can also pull in more lower priority repairs in the process, and thereby slowing down the rate at which our roads deteriorate and reducing the need for future re-visits to the same locations.”