As the Highways Authority for Milton Keynes, MKCC is responsible for maintain the public highway. We carry out regular inspections of our assets including hundreds of bridges, over 58,000 streetlights and over 130 roundabouts. The number of assets we look after is growing all the time with new development areas and adoptions of roads and footways.
Like all local authorities, we have limited budgets so we have to prioritise what work we can do to fix immediate safety issues whilst also looking at how we can maintain our assets for longer so we don't have to keep making regular, minor repairs.
Once a highways issue has been reported to us, we'll look at the details and if necessary, carry out an inspection and assess if it meets our minimum requirements. If it does, it'll be recorded as a defect.
Each year we put together a programme covering the different areas of highways to repair defects and to coordinate as many road closures, resources and materials as we can to make the budget go as far as possible.
If a defect is considered to be a high risk safety issue, we will carry out emergency repairs or will close off an area for safety and plan the necessary works as soon as possible.
For example, if a pothole in the road is considered to be a hazard to road users, we may do a temporary fill to make it safe and then return within a few weeks to carry out a permanent repair.