Of storms, bridges, and Parish Councils

I attended St Bees Parish Council last night and Egremont Town Council this evening.

Both raised concerns about how the impact on Cumbria's roads of the recent storms has been handled.

There are a lot of conference calls and discussions between atgencies about how to deal with the disruption which storms and flooding have caused. A lot of people have been working very hard and I do not want to disparage their efforts.

Equally there are some lessons we need to learn. I will argue that when there is time to do so we need to have a review about how well the agencies communicated with one another and the public. The point has been made to me that there may have been some failings in this respect.

Particular concern has been expressed about the failure to communicate adequately with the public about the closure of the bridge in Egremont and to put in place and publicise alternative travel arrangements.

Closing the bridge may well have been the right thing to do but we need to make sure there are appropriate alternative routes and arrangements in place and they are properly communicated and concerns were expressed to me at Egremont TC tonight that this is simply not happening.

People have ended up walking round on the A595 which is not safe.

I will be taking the matter up with county officers.

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