Backbench councillors on an important committee could be looking at why roadworks in town seem to take so long to complete.

The Labour chairman of the scrutiny committee Jim Robbins has put in an item into the committee’s future work programme – which will have to be agreed at its meeting on Monday – calling for the committee “to review roadworks projects in the town, determine why they are overrunning, and what is causing the delays and what impact are they having".

It says: “Roadworks have the reputation of overrunning in Swindon, with Bruce Street Bridges and Greenbridge seeing significant delays recently. 

"The current massive delays at Mead Way and the Moonrakers are causing huge issues for residents. 

"What lessons can we learn and how do we improve performance with many more planned roadworks in the pipeline?”

Coun Robbins said: “I raised the possibility of carrying out a review at the last meeting, and was delighted to receive cross party support from the Conservative group. 

"Since then, I have written up a plan for the work and am hoping it will be agreed on Monday. 

“Residents have rightly been complaining about the delays we have seen across the town and we need to get to the bottom of why it is happening and how much it is costing taxpayers. 

"The delays of over a year at Mead Way mean it is already over £700,000 over budget and the work is still months from completion.”

In order to get more information on the impact on residents and businesses than would normally be gathered by a council survey, Coun Robbins has asked to use the Adver’s website to get readers’ experiences of how roadworks have affected them.

He said: “I’m delighted that The Advertiser has offered to help us gather information from residents and businesses about how the delays have affected them for this scrutiny investigation.

“I’m really concerned at the lasting impact on Swindon businesses who have already had so many challenges come their way with the pandemic.”

Councillor Kevin Parry, Swindon Borough Council’s cabinet member for service delivery - waste and transport, said: “Our highways team are working incredibly hard to manage a number of extremely complex road improvement schemes, which have been severely hampered by the coronavirus pandemic, particularly during last year’s lengthy lockdown periods.

“Unfortunately, many of the schemes rely on third-party contractors and the inability of some firms to provide staff last year caused delays which have had a knock-on effect on future phases. We have also been hampered by unchartered utilities and sub-standard ground conditions, which only come to light once you start digging beneath the road surface.

“The council has been extremely successful in obtaining many tens of millions of pounds in government funding for these huge projects but, while that is a welcome boost, the deadlines to spend that money, meant that there was inevitably going to be an overlap with many of these schemes.

“I absolutely support the valuable work of the scrutiny committee and I can assure fellow councillors we are doing everything we possibly can to get these major improvement schemes finished as quickly as possible. Over the next three months, both Moonrakers and Mead Way will both be back open to motorists.

“We are always looking to improve performance and the team regularly reviews all large projects to ensure that lessons are learned for future schemes.

"Although accepting the current overrun on Mead Way and Moonrakers is not good enough it is worth pointing out that while there may be a perception of roadworks always over-running in Swindon, the improvements to Greenbridge roundabout and Junction 16 of the M4 are two good examples of significant projects which were both completed on time.”

The scrutiny meeting begins at 6pm on Monday at the council chamber in Euclid Street. 
Members of the public are able to attend in person but must wear a face-covering and observe distancing.