Meeting Highways England

Attended two meetings at County Hall today.

One of them was between county councillors representing Copeland and Highways England to discuss various road issues, and particularly the Moresby Viaduct issue and the proposed Whitehaven Relief Road for the A595.

We kept up the pressure for the Moresby Viaduct issue to be addressed as soon as is consistent with getting a sound, sustainable solution which does not prejudice, or ideally should actually help, with the need for the Relief Road and decent highways access to new developments which Copeland Borough Council wants to build in the area.

With regard to the Relief Road, highways England expects to be able to publish a response to the consultation soon and no later than this summer. We should get confirmation in the Autumn statement whether the Relief Road has been included in "RIS2," the programme of major road works to be completed between 2022 and 2027.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Moresby Viaduct - I understood that Highways England had decided that unless the embankment deteriorates to such a degree that it is obviously unsafe no action will be taken, which is standard practise - do nothing until you have to.
11:38 pm
Chris Whiteside said…
You understand wrong.

They are working on a scheme to deal with it before it becomes unsafe.

Councillors are pressing them to make sure they don't leave it too late.
8:41 am
Chris Whiteside said…
Of course if you were willing to sign your name we could establish who told you what, when and where and clarify the situation.
8:44 am
Anonymous said…
Put the minutes of the meetings with Highways England in the public domain.
12:16 am
Chris Whiteside said…
It was an informal meeting. We did not take minutes.

I would expect however that there will be a report of the meeting to the next Highways Working Group, and the minutes of that meeting will be published with the papers for the Copeland Local Committee.

There is a degree of irony here - the person who put in the above anonymous, repeat, anonymous post asking for more transparency appears to have something of a lack of self-awareness.

My posts on social media are all under my real name, I am open about the offices I hold, the party I am a member of and the area I represent, I list on this blog all the major meetings I attend with links to the web pages where agendas, minutes and papers for those meetings can be found, and I report on many of the other meetings I go to such as the one described above.

And yet I'm being told to provide more transparency by someone who has not revealed whether he or she is one of my constituents or even lives in Cumbria, whether he or she holds or has stood for public office, what party he or she is a member of (if any) or even his or her name.

To repeat a piece of advice which has the very highest authority, take the plank out of your own eye before you offer to take a speck out of mine.
10:04 am
Chris Whiteside said…
The Chairman of the local committee, Councillor Keith Hitchen, has indeed now asked for a report on the meeting with Highways England to be given at the next Highways Working Group.

There will be formal minutes taken of that meeting which will come into the public domain when they are published with the agenda for the following meeting of the Copeland Local Committee of CCC.
10:07 am
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