Agenda and minutes

The Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting.

Apologies were received from Mr A T Amos.

A member of the public wished to speak during Public Participation in relation to Item 8 the Ketch Roundabout.  As no others wished to speak on any other item, the Chairman advised that Public Participation would be moved to before Item 8.

None.

(To follow)

Members felt they had not had sufficient time to confirm the Minutes of the meeting held on 20May 2015 as a correct record,.  A Member felt that some amendments or additions might be required in relation to the discussion on Superfast Broadband and the Chairman agreed to defer the Item to the next meeting.

The Strategic Commissioner Major Projects and the Principal Project Engineer (Street lighting) were invited to discuss progress on the roll out of Street Lighting reductions and potential energy savings.

As outlined in the agenda, in 2012 the County Council spent £2.4 million per annum on energy costs for its 52,000 street lights and 8,000 illuminated road signs (19% of the Council's CO2 emissions).  A Scrutiny Task Group had reviewed ways in which energy and cost savings could be made, the impact on communities and the views of local people. The options considered were switching off, dimming and converting to energy saving lights.

Following a successful trial in Droitwich, Cabinet approved a change in policy to switch off street lighting for part of the night (from midnight to 6am) and endorsed the street lighting energy saving project on 6 February 2014.

A progress report was attached to the agenda at Appendix 2. It was highlighted that the part-night switch off project had been running for over a year and was on target to be completed in April 2016.

The consumption of energy by street lighting was continually reducing. The largest contributor to energy saving was currently the part-night switching off. 

Savings were being achieved through converting some lights to part-night, dimming, and requiring LEDs in new highway schemes.  Any failed units were also being replaced with LEDs. High wattage lamps were being replaced with energy efficient lamps. 

Capital investment was needed to achieve further savings. The Council was reviewing the business case for such capital investment.

To date, 11,000 lamps had been switched to part night illumination.  Benefits included:

·      Annual energy savings of 1,354,000 kiloWatt-hours (kWh)

·      Annual energy cost saving (@ 11p per kWh) of  £150,000

·      Annual carbon commitment charges saving per annum (@ £16per tonne) of £9700.

Currently, around 400 comments had been received from residents.  Most were for individual lights to be switched back on or for the initiative to be halted because, for example, crime may increase, vehicles were left vulnerable on unlit highways and people did not feel safe after midnight. However, there was no hard evidence from the police that reduced lighting was directly linked to individual crimes. The project team had ongoing discussions with local policing teams, however to date no requests from the public had resulted in lights being switched back on.  There had been some increases crime in some areas but these were spread over day and night time periods and could not be attributed to lights being switched off.

Only lights in residential areas were being switched off, not those on main traffic routes. About one third would remain lit all night at locations such as junctions and bends. It was acknowledged that mistakes could be made and that some switched off lights could be swapped with others if necessary.

Maps showing which lights would be part-night illuminated and which would remain on all night were published on the County Council's website.  Each plan was also displayed in the local library. At  ...  view the full minutes text for item 214.

The Director of Business, Environment and Community, the Strategic Commissioner – Major Projects, the Infrastructure Asset Manager and the Cabinet Member with Responsibility for Highways were invited to discuss the Highways Maintenance Service Contract (HMSC).

As outlined in the agenda, the new Highways Maintenance Contract was awarded to Ringway from 1 April 2014.  Cabinet suggested that, in support of the review process, a scrutiny review be undertaken 12 to 18 months from contract award.

On 27 March 2014, this Panel had received an update on the differences between the old and the new contract and how the new contract was expected to deliver better value for money (details of the new contract were outlined in the 12 December 2014 Cabinet agenda).  Further detail and an update on the new contract were attached at Appendix 1 to the agenda for this meeting.

Headline statistics for the first 12 months of the contract were as follows:

·       154km (5.2% of the network) of planned Carriageway Surfacing projects and 138,000sqm of structural Carriageway patching delivered

·       32,423 Safety Defects completed (all within the allocated time)

·       Over 49,000 Gullies emptied

·       Over 12,000t of recycled material produced at Stamford Depot

·       £400k of Vehicle Restraint Systems upgraded.

The Panel was advised that the main difference between the old (NEC contract) and the new (HMSC) contract was that the new one was outcome based.  This was a major change to how the various cyclic services, such as gully emptying, were delivered as it allowed the Contractor to programme the works for a set price within the constraints detailed in the Service Information. This led to greater efficiency, producing a saving of £850k per annum when compared to the previous Contract.

One way savings were achieved was by carrying out a number of cyclic activities under the same Traffic Management, particularly on high speed roads. A number of cyclic functions were carried out all within the confines of the single lane closure including inviting District Councils to carry out their functions such as litter picking at the same time.

One of the main points of focus of the new Contract was on completing the work required to the agreed programme.  Most work was delivered on time.

The new Contract had a number of mechanisms to control prices and costs year on year. These were based on the successful mechanisms included in the previous contract but using the experience of that contract they had been modified to enhance the effects. 

The Price Adjustment Factor (PAF) adjusts the service prices to account for inflation and had been refined to better reflect variable cost elements used in each Service Area. For example, carriageway surfacing and administration were two of six or seven service areas where different indices reflected variable cost elements in each such as the cost of bituminous material or labour costs respectively. The PAF had led to prices being reduced in a range between -0.2% and -5.5% for 2015/16 apart from the Management Service Area which had risen by 2%.

·        The  ...  view the full minutes text for item 215.

The Cabinet Member for Highways, the Director of Business Environment and Community, and the Community Relations and Engagement Manager, were invited to discuss progress on how public satisfaction with the condition of roads might be improved.

As outlined in the agenda, in autumn/winter 2013/14, the Directorate investigated why public satisfaction had declined from 42% to around 31% even though road condition was being maintained or improved. The aim of the exercise was to gather objective evidence to understand the drivers of public satisfaction with road condition and identify how it might be improved either by highway service activity and/or communications campaigns.

An officer/member working group was also formed in November 2014 with the objective to review and implement cost effective ways to increase positive public perception and address the key issues identified from the Oakham Research. The group identified a number of key initiatives that could be achieved quickly to help improve satisfaction, including for example, parish makeovers, signage, white lining and improving communication about highways with district, town and parish councils.  The Group also agreed that the Council would join the national Highways and Transport Survey 2015 to enable comparison with similar authorities. Further detail was outlined in the agenda at Appendix 2, including that to increase the offer of Parish Makeovers to a maximum of 20, Councillors would have the opportunity to use their local members Highways Fund.

During the ensuing discussion, the following main points were made.

In Leicestershire, public satisfaction with road condition had been the highest in the Country at 57%, although, in line with national trends, satisfaction had fallen recently to 36%.  Officers had discussed road condition and improving satisfaction with their Leicestershire colleagues and found that they were not doing anything differently.  Leicestershire were interested in Worcestershire's plans to improve satisfaction.   Like in this County, people in Leicestershire were mainly concerned about pot holes, quality of repair, surface condition and signage.  

It should be carefully considered whether it was worth spending on improving satisfaction or whether it was better to spend on actual maintenance and black stuff.

Members noted that two of the common concerns raised by the public were parking on footways and overgrown vegetation obscuring signs.  It was more difficult for the County Council to act on these as the District Councils had responsibility for parking issues and it was often landowners who were responsible for their vegetation obscuring signs.

'Thank you for your patience. Another Highways job done' signs were being displayed after prominent works had been completed in the County.  These were a low cost measure to try and improve levels of satisfaction and more were planned. 

Members welcomed the plans (in partnership with the LEP) to put 'Worcestershire welcomes you' signs on A roads at County boundaries although suggested that 'World Class Worcestershire welcomes you' might be more appropriate.

The last time the Panel discussed public satisfaction with roads in Worcestershire, Members felt it was important to know whether people based their judgement on satisfaction with road condition  ...  view the full minutes text for item 216.

Members of the public wishing to take part should notify the Head of Legal and Democratic Services in writing or by email indicating the nature and content of their proposed participation no later than 9.00am on the working day before the meeting (in this case 23 June 2015 ).  Enquiries can be made through the telephone number/email address below.

Mr Adrian Clark was a Member of the Worcester Transport Forum, set up by Lisa Ventura so that people could have their say on local transport issues. Mr Clark had started a petition against surface dressing on their Facebook site.

He asked why problems with the Ketch roundabout had not been foreseen at the design stage.  There was a very short slip road with two lanes into one going south onto the Carrington Bridge, causing drivers to cut in. There were no traffic barriers to prevent head on collisions with oncoming traffic and there had been several near misses as evidenced by the YouTtube video posted on Councillor Tom Wells' Facebook page.  Whittington roundabout had also caused problems for drivers and he was seeking an explanation on why the roundabouts were designed the way they were.

The recent public concerns about the Ketch Roundabout were raised at the Overview and Scrutiny Performance Board on 8 June 2015.  Given the public interest, the Board asked this Panel to look into the issue at its next meeting.  The Cabinet Member for the Economy, Skills and Infrastructure and the Director of Business, Environment and Community were therefore invited to discuss the issue.

The Cabinet Member began by setting the context and explaining why the Council was doing things the way it was.  The A4440 from Whittington to Powick roundabout was the most congested route in the County with 30,000 vehicle movements per day, holding back growth in the County and affecting the city's economy and environment.  The plan was to dual the entire stretch.

The Carrington and City Centre Bridges were the only two river crossings for traffic in Worcester and improving performance (traffic flow) on the Southern Link part of the A4440 was of key importance.  The work had to be done in phases when funding became available.  The first phase was the Whittington roundabout at a cost of about £1.7m.  The second phase was the Ketch roundabout enlargement and dualling from the Norton roundabout to the Ketch at a cost of over £8m (£6m of funding came from Government with £2m from the local authority).  The third phase was to dual from the Norton roundabout to the Whittington roundabout at a cost of £33m. This included enlarging the Norton Roundabout and enabling the Whittington roundabout slip road (turning left coming from the M5 towards Malvern) to 'plug in' to the new dual carriageway. Work on phase 3 was due to start in the Autumn and should be finished by 2018.  The fourth phase was to dual the entire stretch from the Ketch to Powick roundabout.  Funding was still being sought from central Government.

The dualling of the Southern Link Road was linked to joint Development Plans for housing, schools, and shopping for the districts of Worcester City, Wychavon and Malvern Hills as well as linked to the Strategic Economic Plan (SEP).  It was planned to build around 2,000 properties on the land between Norton and the Ketch.

The Director explained that Worcestershire Highways was a collaboration of Worcestershire County Council staff and its Highways Contractor.  Worcestershire's road safety record was comparatively good compared to other local authorities. There had been an 18% reduction in those killed or seriously injured on roads in Worcestershire over the last few years. 

The Council was not in denial about some technical aspects of the design of the Ketch roundabout. The Director had seen the video of near misses, and wished to thank the public for the speed of their reaction and apologised to all those who had had unsettling experiences on the merge lane going onto the Carrington Bridge.  Immediate safety action had been taken which resulted in the coning off of the right hand approach lane and accelerating the safety audit (now completed).  The safety audit recently carried out  ...  view the full minutes text for item 218.