Rain threat to surface dressing work

Surface dressing work on some of Norfolk’s roads could have to be put on hold until next year unless the rainy weather stops soon.

Norfolk County Council said the work is currently two weeks behind schedule due to bad weather.

And officials are now warning that if the rain doesn't stop by August they will have to decide if they should curtail the work until next year.

The potential problem was raised at a meeting of the county council’s environment, transport and development overview and scrutiny panel this week where councillors agreed to put an extra £500,000 into the surface dressing programme, bringing it up to £12.5m.

But the Norwich Evening News reported that John Joyce, assistant director for highways at the county council, said of the rain-hit programme: “It is a bit weather susceptible and the net effect of that is we have lost something of the order of a 30 day period in terms of delivering the programme.

“The contractors are working longer days and weekends, so we have clawed back a bit of that and are now about two weeks behind, but the programme is being held up by circumstances beyond our control.

“We will have to reach a decision point towards the end of August, when the weather tends to get worse.

“At that point, we will have to make a decision as to whether we can work a few more weeks. But if the weather takes a turn for the worse, we may have to curtail the programme. We are a little bit in the hands of the weather at the moment.”