Sunderland to get £184,000 to fix city’s potholes

Embargoed to 0001 Thursday April 7 File photo dated 16/02/11 of a car passing a pothole as the Government's £50 million funding boost to remove potholes is "a step in the right direction" but councils need more than 230 times that amount, the Local Government Association (LGA) has warned.
Picture by: Danny Lawson / PA Wire/Press Association Images

Sunderland is to get £184,000 to fix potholes in the city the Government has announced today (Thursday, April 7).

The money will enable the council to fill 3,472 potholes.

Motorists and cyclists are set to benefit after the Government announced how £50 million of funding will repair nearly 1 million potholes across the country over the next 12 months.

12 councils in the North East will receive a share of over £3 million, helping to remove around 58,000 potholes from local roads during this financial year.

The funding has been made available as part of the £250 million Pothole Action Fund included in last month’s Budget, which will fix over four million potholes by 2020/21.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said: “I know how important well-maintained roads are to people across the North East.

“Almost every journey starts and ends on a local road, so the government is giving councils in the North East over £3 million specifically to tackle the blight of potholes in their area.

“This is just one part of our unprecedented investment in local road maintenance over the next five years.

“We are giving a record £267 million to local authorities in North East that will support the Northern Powerhouse and improve journeys for all.”

Gateshead will receive £143,000 to fix 2,698 potholes, while Newcastle will receive £152,000 to fix 2,868 in the area.

In the Tyneside area, North Tyneside will receive £138,000 to fix 2,604 potholes.

Meanwhile, South Tyneside will receive £100,000 to fix 1,887 potholes.

In total, the Government is spending a record £6.1billion nationwide on local highways maintenance between 2015/16 and 2020/21, giving councils long-term certainty for the first time to plan future work with the aim of preventing potholes and improving local roads, bridges and street lighting.

As part of this investment, the Pothole Action Fund will give local authorities in England £50 million a year, over the next 5 years, to help them tackle more than four million potholes.

Funding is calculated according to the size of the local road network in the area.

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