Potholes (again)!

[Lmafudd]

1 hour ago, Mr_Groundhog said:

It's worse: they paid good money to buy that land and they'll now sell it to party donors at a discount.

@Lmafudd @LenT Not for the Bengals he wasn't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943

Can I just state that I didn't mention Winston Churchill. From the biographies I have read I would say that he was the right man for the job at the time. He appeared to have many personality deficiencies in lots of areas but supposing that no one is perfect we have to accept them and move on!

[Lmafudd]

11 minutes ago, Malc1 said:

Best to give up moaning whingeing and  whining ……. just accept it’s what it is …… makes for a quieter less stressful life …….. more tea vicar 👍 ……. and be HAPPY 

Malc 

You can't have Tea, there's a shortage! ........More Coffee Vicar? And cake is off the menu due to your arteries!

[Mr_Groundhog]

29 minutes ago, Lmafudd said:

You can't have Tea, there's a shortage! ........More Coffee Vicar? And cake is off the menu due to your arteries!

Don't mind him. If we were slaves he'd justify not only the whipping but slavery itself.

"Give up moaning and accept it" he'd say. 

[Linas.P]

15 hours ago, Newbie777 said:

so raise taxes and do a proper job on the roads like they used in the 70's and 80's.

Really? Government raised £40bn (or there about - 37, 38, 39 in recent years) from motorists and only spent ~£4bn on the roads. 

So they already raising 10 times more taxes than they spend on the roads and solution is "more taxes"? NO... 

This is purely the prioritisation problem, they know they can shaite on roads and drivers, it is socially acceptable to do so, so that is where the cuts are made first. In countries where road quality is big deal and politicians are elected on the basis on how good the roads are they always find fund to fix the roads. That is not the case in UK, because their election does not rely on road quality, I would say in UK more voters are swinged on the basis of NHS funding, maybe policing reforms, pensions in particular, taxation etc. roads don't even come into top 10. And until that is going to be the case they will always be shaite. It is not lack of taxation, it is just matter of prioritising. Also let's just face it - there are no alternatives, Tories are already a party in favour of private transportation (consider fuel duty freezes), so the only alternative to them is Labour, who are strictly ANTI-motorists and would defund the roads even more and cancel all the road improvement projects (they say so in their manifesto). So there is simply no political pressures to do anything. Because let's say Labour would be in power now and Tories would say "if we get into the power we will rebuild British roads"... and somehow that would resonate with society and there would be noticeable uptick in polling... only then something would be done because it would look like that could be political matter. Now there is simply no reason, the alternative government, if anything, would be worse for roads and motoring overall. I guess what I am saying - it is almost beneficial to get Labour into next government and then let Tories to put pressure on them, that is politically probably quickest way to get attention.

And yes I know many roads, especially local once are looked after by local authority, bet overall guidance still comes from national government, also overall voter trends... and currently there is no incentives. Fixing roads does not win the votes, so the roads are increasingly shaite. That is the reality.

[Mr_Groundhog]

4 hours ago, Linas.P said:

This is purely the prioritisation problem, they know they can shaite on roads and drivers, it is socially acceptable to do so, so that is where the cuts are made first. In countries where road quality is big deal and politicians are elected on the basis on how good the roads are they always find fund to fix the roads. That is not the case in UK, because their election does not rely on road quality, I would say in UK more voters are swinged on the basis of NHS funding, maybe policing reforms, pensions in particular, taxation etc. roads don't even come into top 10. And until that is going to be the case they will always be shaite. It is not lack of taxation, it is just matter of prioritising. Also let's just face it - there are no alternatives, Tories are already a party in favour of private transportation (consider fuel duty freezes), so the only alternative to them is Labour, who are strictly ANTI-motorists and would defund the roads even more and cancel all the road improvement projects (they say so in their manifesto). So there is simply no political pressures to do anything. Because let's say Labour would be in power now and Tories would say "if we get into the power we will rebuild British roads"... and somehow that would resonate with society and there would be noticeable uptick in polling... only then something would be done because it would look like that could be political matter. Now there is simply no reason, the alternative government, if anything, would be worse for roads and motoring overall. I guess what I am saying - it is almost beneficial to get Labour into next government and then let Tories to put pressure on them, that is politically probably quickest way to get attention.

Oh man 😀 can you read that again?

You say funding goes to NHS, policing, pensions, etc.. and none of those things is any better now (rather much worse!). Schools literally crumbling above children. The money goes to private consultancies milking the public sector (I know cuz I had to work in one of them, it was disgusting) + the oligopolies of privatised-but-subsidised things like Rail companies ("free money" said the Rail fat cats on their powerpoints).

You are drawing this strange line between motorists and the Tories when we are in this situation after suffering them for 13 years; but you still believe they would care "if..."? They only care about themselves mate.
Whoever still believes them deserves to have them elected for another term...

Talk about cognitive dissonance!
Yes Labout have sadly turned into Tory-lite, I know. They distinctly haven't run the country the last 13yrs though.

[Linas.P]

4 minutes ago, Mr_Groundhog said:

Oh man 😀 can you read that again?

You say funding goes to NHS, policing, pensions, etc.. and none of those things is any better now (rather much worse!). Schools literally crumbling above children. The money goes to private consultancies milking the public sector (I know cuz I had to work in one of them, it was disgusting) + the oligopolies of privatised-but-subsidised things like Rail companies ("free money" said the Rail fat cats on their powerpoints).

You are drawing this strange line between motorists and the Tories when we are in this situation after suffering them for 13 years; but you still believe they would care "if..."? They only care about themselves mate.
Whoever still believes them deserves to have them elected for another term...

Talk about cognitive dissonance!
Yes Labout have sadly turned into Tory-lite, I know. They distinctly haven't run the country the last 13yrs though.

Where did I say NHS or any other public services are good?

No - what I am saying, people care about them, but not about the roads. Politicians knows this and at least they pretend to make them better. That does not make them better, but at least they have some fffed-up plan, they put it on manifesto, they promise something... at least there is some sort of discussion that maybe that needs to be done, maybe it is not good enough... roads... pfffff nothing, they are not even listed... "what roads... what about them... why are you even driving... are you not ashamed of yourself?!"... because you know it is popular to slag off driver, it is considered almost a "class" thing.... "those disgusting drivers, nothing good comes from them, just polluting and complaining all the time". Roads - be thankful you even allowed to still use them, actually being suitable for the amount of traffic or drivable... forget it!

And yes you right - Tories are doing lip service for motorists at best, but Labour is openly hostile to the idea of personal transportation. that is why for roads to get better we need some sort of convoluted political situation... where Labour is in power, where Tories are in opposition and where Tories propose road rebuilding programme or some shaite they will never be able to complete because they are too corrupt... but then that move the polls significantly. To the point where Labour goes "OMG - that road promise may win the election, we must do something about it"... and by the way they would do something about it, they would set-up some publicly owned company, that would have sole purpose of doing nothing else, but surfacing the roads for 10 years and then would be useless and inefficient after that. That is Labour way - create something useful and then let it lose the purpose and become inefficient over the time, so that Tories can come in and sell it off to their mates. 

But I doubt it would ever happen, British people despite of still being dependant on the car (78% of all journeys in the country) are the most fundamentally anti-car culture people in Europe. I don't know why, bet individual transportation is for some reason are really looked at negatively here.

[Mossypossy]

Positive spin.

[wharfhouse]

I know it's doing the councils work for them, but they seem to only rely on the public's reporting these days and so if you can, report any potholes in your local area (this can often be done online via the council's websites or other 3rd party websites). It doesn't always result in a fix (they may reject it as not bad enough - yet) but other times will fix it - and if they don't fix it and damage then occurs to a vehicle, or worse, they can't say they didn't know about it and will be liable to for the damage. I reported a few more in my local area about a week ago - one was rejected as not bad enough to fix but one has now been fixed (within a week) and some more are still under investigation (and given that some of these are worse that the one that has been fixed I am hopeful they will address them). 

[Boomer54]

Here in Preston we find the upside to every hole.