Scheduled works for the winter months

I was pleased to hear about plans for the winter programme for the Central area, which includes the four Ponteland wards, which were discussed in a recent meeting with the Highways and Neighbourhood Services teams at Northumberland County Council. The winter programme will run up until around mid-March next year when the first grass cuts of the year commence.

There is plenty of work planned to be carried out over the course of the winter, including shrub maintenance, path clearance and low-level tree work in Darras Hall, Ponteland and Heddon-on-the-Wall.

The Council has done great work to get ride of a huge backlog of potholes in the county, and they will be continuing the work this winter. The definition of a pothole is a 40mm deep hole with an abrupt edge and 300mm wide in any direction, and it is these potholes that are actionable – please let me know about any in your area.

The county’s 86,000 gullies are inspected on an 18 month inspection cycle for ones that don’t have an environmental impact and on a red, amber and green system for those that pose risks. These are done either twice or three times per year to minimise potential flooding issues.

It’s good to hear about all the works that will be taking place in the next few months and the determination of Northumberland County Council to tackle these outstanding issues.