County Councillor Tariq Sadiq, Labour Group Leader, is launching ‘Puddle-Watch’ to persuade the County Council to repair roads, pavements and drains across Cambridgeshire.
He recently got the County Council to fix a long-running problem in Radegund Road in his Coleridge ward where some residents had suffered years of having to wade through pools of water outside their homes because the drainage was completely inadequate. He also recently had some road junctions repaired on Cherry Hinton Road after a wheelchair user had contacted him about getting stuck on uneven junctions.
He said ”After the recent rain residents will have noticed lots of puddles in Cambridge and across the County. Large amounts of standing water on our streets and pavements are a nuisance especially at junctions where people have to cross the road. But puddles are just a symptom of other serious problems: blocked drains, broken kerbs, and poorly maintained roads and pavements. So not only does it mean that people have to navigate rivers and lakes when it rains, but the elderly, infirm, wheelchair-users and mums and dads with prams find it hard to get about even when it’s not raining.
”That is not good enough for such a prestigious and world-famous city like Cambridge but I think it’s an issue across the County and it affects people’s quality of life in a very real way so I want the County Council to address the problem which is why we came up with the idea of ‘Puddle-Watch’.
“If you notice a large puddle in your area that doesn’t drain away easily report it to the County Council using either the Council’s own fault reporting website www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/transport/roads/reportingafault.htm or Fix My Street www.fixmystreet.com. You can mark the location of the puddle on an online map and track progress in fixing it.”
“We want as many people as possible to report these faults so we can get a good picture of where the problems lie and make sure the County Council regularly flushes drains and fixes broken pavements and junctions where people have to cross. Opposition Labour councillors will ask Conservative County Council leaders how many reports they’ve received and how many problems they’ve fixed so we can make sure that they aren’t simply ignored.”
‘Not maintaining roads and pavements properly is a false economy because it just means we store up bigger problems for the future and in a place like Cambridge we need to invest in our infrastructure properly if we’re to continue to be one of the most successful cities in the world and attractive to business and visitors.”
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