Too many Fife motorists are still paying the price for pockmarked roads.
In our four-part Counting the Cost of Potholes series, we will be scrutinising how much local authorities are investing in carriageway repairs.
And we will be highlighting the stories of some of the people who have lost money, time and goodwill after potholes damaged their vehicles.
Fife Council’s spending on resurfacing and patching roads tumbled during the pandemic.
And although workers have managed to fix 10,000 potholes, bosses admit much, much more needs to be done.
Fife resident Rachael Lindsay is currently in a compensation wrangle with the council.
Rachael hit a pothole on the B-road leading to Wormit.
Her car suffered two burst tyres and had to be towed to a garage.
It cost her nearly £400.
And she said the council is reluctant to pay compensation.
Council in ‘no hurry’ to answer emails
“Fife Council and their insurers don’t appear to be in any hurry to answer my emails and I know others have had difficulty with their claims,” said Rachael.
Similar to many roads in Fife, a patchwork of potholes, some repaired and some waiting to be filled in, can be seen on the surface of the B946.
Rachael said she was unable to avoid the trough in the road.
If she had manoeuvred around it she risked colliding with oncoming traffic.
She said: “I am shocked by the state of local roads and so are many local people.
“The road is meant to be for two-way traffic and so should have been safe but it wasn’t.”
Fife potholes repair backlog blamed on Covid-19
Fife Council spent significantly less capital funds on carriageway resurfacing last year compared to the year before.
Expenditure fell from £7.4m to £5.4m.
Meanwhile, the council had budgeted for nearly £2.2m worth of planned patching work last financial year but spent just £1.3m.
According to the council work could not go ahead because of Covid-19 restrictions.
In contrast, more was spent on reactive repairs.
The authority robustly defends it handling of roads maintenance.
It says its teams have filled in 10,000 potholes since the start of the year.
And it has deployed extra teams to tackle the backlog of road repairs.
But the council has been criticised for using the pandemic as an excuse.
Covid was an ideal opportunity to accelerate the planned patching programmes.”
Scott Dixon
Consumer expert Scott Dixon has been helping motorists with pothole compensation claims.
He does not accept that lockdown was a reason not to repair roads.
“Covid-19 was an ideal opportunity to accelerate the planned patching programmes while the roads were quiet and carry out repairs to the highest standard without affecting road users.
“Using Covid-19 and bad weather as an excuse for negligence is simply unacceptable. Fife Council’s taxpayers and road users deserve much better than this.
“Fife Council needs to explain why they have been taking a reactive approach rather than a proactive approach throughout the pandemic.”
Neglecting roads makes ‘no sense’
The Fife branch of IAM RoadSmart – a charity working to improve driving standards and road safety – warned that road defects and substandard repairs are a “major concern for all road users”.
Cyclists and motorcyclists are particularly vulnerable to injury if they hit a hole in the road.
Local Lib Dem councillor Jonny Tepp is calling for the council’s SNP-Labour administration to make a long term commitment to investing in roads and bringing them up to standard.
“As we said at the budget it makes no sense not to.
“The need is obvious.
“I am fed up of hearing about damage to cars costing hundreds of pounds a time.
“Money that motorists cannot recover from the council, and many cannot recover from their insurers.”
Fife Council is investing £9.9 million in repairing and improving roads over the next two years.
Labour councillor Altany Craik is convener of the council’s Economy, Tourism, Strategic Planning and Transportation sub committee.
He said he “shared frustrations” about the amount of potholes in Fife.
And he conceded that the region’s roads were not up to the standard Fifers should expect.
But he said council teams were working hard to repair potholes and carry out “larger scale patching” of carriageways.
“I can reassure local people that we are working very hard with the resources available to us to bring our roads network up to scratch.
“The backlog of repairs is slowly coming down and we’ve repaired over 10,000 potholes since the start of the year.”