Road bridges across Perth and Kinross and Fife have been branded “substandard” with concerns raised over how long they can remain in use without major investment.
Concerns have been raised about more than 3,000 council-maintained road bridges across Great Britain, but those in the two areas are among the worst offenders.
Council chiefs, alongside those at other cash strapped local authorities, have been forced to let the structures deteriorate in the face of crippling budget cuts.
The result is a repair backlog running into hundreds of millions of pounds nationally and a roads network that in many places is off limits to heavy vehicles.
Fife Council has said it will spend £12.7 million improving its roads infrastructure between now and 2025.
Perth and Kinross chiefs have stressed that the bridges pose no risk and that the most concerning are scheduled for improvement works as part of a “long term” plan.
Data collected by the RAC Foundation found that 3,203 structures – about one in 23 – over 1.5m in span are no longer fit to carry the heaviest vehicles.
Many of these bridges have weight restrictions. Others will be under programmes of increased monitoring or even managed decline.
Perth and Kinross, Fife, Stirling, Falkirk and Aberdeenshire have been identified as among the ten Scottish councils with the highest proportion of substandard road bridges.
Perth and Kinross placed third on the list, with six percent (55 of 915) of its road bridges assessed as substandard, followed by Stirling, of whose bridges six percent (22 of 397) also failed to impress.
They were followed by Fife (5% or 19 of 389), Aberdeenshire (4% or 59 of 1,350) and Falkirk (4% or 8 of 208).
Steve Gooding, director of the RAC Foundation, said: “It’s the pothole backlog that normally hits the headlines but it is easy to forget all the other aspects of road maintenance that councils are involved in; from clearing ditches to cutting verges to maintaining bridges.
“In the face of growing traffic volumes and ageing infrastructure the danger is that without an adequate long-term funding settlement we will see more rather than fewer bridges with weight restrictions, with the backlog bill getting bigger all the time.”
The one-off cost of bringing all the substandard bridges back up to perfect condition would be around £890 million, the equivalent of £278,000 per structure.
The total cost of clearing the backlog of work on all bridges – including those that are substandard – is estimated at £3.9 billion.
Fife Council’s Murray Scott said: “While the vast majority of our bridges satisfy load capacity requirements, a small proportion of council-owned bridges require measures to be in place to make sure they continue to be safe to use.
“Usually these will be a reduction in carriageway width, one-way traffic or a signed weight restriction.
“Our rolling programme of bridge works was approved by the council in May 2016, setting out the priority bridge works programme until 2025 with investment totalling £10m.
“The same report highlighted the need for continued investment to fund bridge strengthening works and the approved 2017 budget allocated a further £2.7m for priority strengthening schemes.”
Within Perth and Kinross, the challenge facing the council has not been helped by accident and storm damage.
Significant sums will have to be spent restoring the historic Allt A’Mhoirneas crossing, near Killin, which was left damaged after a crash.
A £1m repair job at Bleaton Hallet, Alyth, has just been completed. The bridge was badly damaged by floods.
A spokeswoman said: “While Perth and Kinross Council recognise that a number of bridges have been identified as being “substandard” we can confirm that these are either signed with a weight restriction, or are subject to an enhanced monitoring regime to ensure that they are safe for use and that there is no risk to the travelling public.
“In addition, there is an ongoing long term programme of bridge works which is targeted to reduce the number of bridges of concern.”