We have letters to and from Rochdale Council going back to 1987 showing that local residents have been patiently asking that these roads are surfaced and maintained to a reasonable and safe standard, but all we have had is temporary patch repairs that are destroyed in the next storm due to poor drainage. This is a waste of public money and the roads continue to be dangerous to use whether on foot, on bike, on horseback or in a car. Yes, money is tight right now but the work has been promised for over 25 years and an accident could mean a claim that costs the Council millions. All we ask is for safe roads that stay that way.
Dear members of the Township Committee,
For over 25 years, residents of Birtle have been writing to the Council asking that Elbut Lane and Birtle Road be properly surfaced.
For over 25 years reports have been written, studies of the drainage problems have been carried out by successive Councillors and officers. These requests and the nature of what needs to be done have been aknowledged time and again by the Council and yet after all this, the hundreds of people who use these roads each day, from volunteers who walk alongside disabled riders, to visitors to the licensed premises (who are losing trade), to the dozens of walkers who share these mostly unpaved roads with motorists and commercial vehicles have had to accept roads that are dangerous for everyone that uses them.
For 25 years, public money spent on patch repairs that has simply been washed away, time after time.
Everyone knows that budgets are tight but this problem has existed for decades and it is not the fault of residents or anyone who uses the road that the state of the road has reached crisis point now, to the point that it is both an accident waiting to happen and the problems so well known to the Council that any accident is more than likely to result in a claim against the Council that would dwarf the cost of doing the job properly in the first place.
All we ask is that the Council does what it said would be done a quarter of a century ago. Is that an unreasonable request?
On behalf of the residents of Birtle and the users of Elbut Lane and Birtle Road.
