Highways & Transport Members' Update

Winter readiness - Flooding & Prevention

This autumn we are encouraging communities to prepare for winter and hopefully avoid the worst of any winter flooding. 

Simple checks to ensure that road gullies are kept clear of leaves, ensuring that culverts under the road and ditches are clear can make a big difference during periods of heavy rain. 

Often residents living next to ditches are unaware that they may be responsible for the maintenance and up keep of that ditch as riparian landowners. If residents are unaware who is responsible or how to carry out maintenance, they are encouraged to contact their local borough or district council Land Drainage Engineer or WSCC's Flood Risk Management Team. 

Local parish council’s also have a number of documents about riparian responsibilities entitled ‘Good Practice for Watercourse Maintenance’ and ‘Living next to a watercourse your rights and responsibilities’.

A recent press release and YouTube video clip (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmzairxU5dQ) encouraged residents to help rake leaves away from road gullies to stop them blocking up. Cabinet Member for Highways and Transport, Bob Lanzer, said: “Leaves blocking drains is a common problem every autumn. Any help we can get from residents clearing leaves can have an impact on stopping flooding before it starts. We look after 137,000 highways drains and gullies across the county, and it is hard to predict where leaves collect and where issues will arise”.

If flooding problems persist after a drain has been cleared of leaves, you can report them by visiting www.westsussex.gov.uk/roadpavementproblem

Residents in areas at risk of flooding from rivers or the sea are encouraged to sign up to the Environment Agency ‘Floodline Warnings Direct’ which is a free service that provides flood warnings by phone, text or email.

https://fwd.environment-agency.gov.uk/app/olr/register

Residents can also find information about local flood warnings and river levels on the Environment Agency’s Flood information service –

https://flood-warning-information.service.gov.uk/

Over the summer Environment Agency teams across England have been training with new temporary flood barriers, pumps, vehicles, and drones as part of Exercise Certus.

The exercise, which involves around 1,000 staff, is designed to test that the Environment Agency is ready to respond more rapidly and flexibly to future flooding anywhere in England.

As well as new technology the Environment Agency has awarded a 1-year contract to Stobart Group to store, track, and transport its 40 kilometres of temporary barriers and other mobile equipment. The contract will include use of the Stobart Group’s network of resilience centres, distribution centres and extensive fleet of over 3,000 trucks.

The Government has also announced that up to 1,200 soldiers are on standby over the coming months to tackle flood crises. The deployment is part of what ministers claim is the most comprehensive winter plans ever put in place.

Programmed Roadworks

Please see our heat map for details of up-coming works.

The heat map highlights works by class of road, duration of the works and the traffic management in place. The Heat Maps are updated weekly and show a months data. An explanatory guide is also available.

The data includes works by West Sussex Highways, Highways England and utility companies and is extracted from the Travel Information Map which is on the web site for customers to see.

Highways Customer Service Hub update

We experienced an increase of enquiries following Storm Angus, with a number of reports of fallen trees or hanging branches, as well those relating to blocked drains and flooding. This has been well coordinated with Balfour Beatty, the Contact Centre, the Hub and Highways working together to respond to the reports.  

The winter months now mean we are pro-actively tweeting the winter decisions and advising our followers as to whether or not we are gritting. 

We are also continuing to use Twitter to pro-actively communicate other highway related matters to our customers.

For instance, on 23 November there was a burst water main on the A2032 Littlehampton Road (ironically outside Southern Water Headquarters) which resulted in a lane closure to westbound traffic. With some pro-active messages via Twitter and keeping the Contact Centre regularly updated, we were able to manage this with minimal contact from customers. 

On the 24 November the decision was then made to close the road for westbound traffic but again with some pro-active messages we didn’t receive any customer enquires which is a great example of how pro-active messaging keeps our customers informed.

Bus User Survey

We are running a Bus User Survey seeking to understand likely impacts of proposed changes to a number of local bus routes.

We are proposing to make the following changes to a number of subsidised local bus services next year, due to falling passenger numbers on some routes, and the impact of these on others.

The routes and proposed changes are as follows:

Compass Travel 12 : Littlehampton town bus

Completely revised service to serve two new developments (Littlehampton Town Council are carrying out local consultation)

Compass Travel 19 : Shoreham Beach – Holmbush Farm

Journeys after 17:25 withdrawn.

Compass Travel 37 : Haywards Heath – Crawley

The commercially run service is being withdrawn on 9 January 2017. The route is largely duplicated by Metrobus 271, but the 37 is the only bus service to Balcombe. A couple of journeys on Compass service 40 extended to Balcombe and Crawley to retain the shopping facility that existed prior to the introduction of the 37 in September 2013.

Stagecoach 56 : Old Bosham – Chichester – Arundel Park

Early morning journeys before 07:50 withdrawn.

Compass Travel 72/73 : Pulborough - Amberley – Storrington – Ashington

Service completely revised and extended to Horsham via West Chiltington Village, Shipley, Maplehurst and Nuthurst in mitigation for changes to services 74/75, 89 & 108. The 72/73 would no longer serve Thakeham and Ashington.

Compass Travel 74/75 : Storrington/Petworth – Barns Green – Horsham

Service withdrawn, partly replaced by diversion of some 100 journeys.

Compass Travel 89 : Horsham – Haywards Heath

Saturday service withdrawn.

Compass Travel 93/96 : Midhurst area villages service

Service reduced from two days a week to one day per week.

Compass Travel 100 : Burgess Hill – Pulborough – Horsham

A few journeys diverted via Barns Green between Billingshurst & Horsham to partly replace withdrawn route 74/75 above.

Compass Travel 108 : Shoreham – Steyning – Horsham

Service withdrawn.

Compass Travel 150 : Selsey – East Wittering – West Itchenor

Service reduced from three days per week to one or two days per week.

We need feedback from passengers and local communities so we can understand the potential impact of proposed changes to these routes.

You can find out more and access the survey here

Alternatively, any comments or questions can be emailed to buses@westsussex.gov.uk

The closing date for responses is 18 December 2016.

Media Stories

Here are our latest news stories to be issued:

• Successful Operation Watershed bid for mapping tool benefits every parish in the county – Funding will help set up Parish Online mapping software across West Sussex
• Salt bags delivered to community groups to keep vulnerable residents safe – small packs will be used to salt paths from front door to the road
• Greater numbers of potholes filled in preparation for winter ahead – more defects have already been fixed this year compared to 2015

Infrastructure Team Updates

Structures - bridge works in progress

Gatwick Road Footbridge, Crawley

The footbridge, shown in the photo, has been completed and re-opened to the public. 

A283 New Stopham Bridge, Pulborough

We are due to return to site on 5 and 6 December to complete the drainage works at the bridge under single lane working (off-peak).

B2113 Burgess Hill Station Railway Bridge –Kerb Re-alignment

The joint scheme with Network Rail to re-align the kerbs on the bridge has been postponed until August 2017 due to road space booking issues. We are currently liaising with Streetworks to see if the works can be combined with any other works in the area. 

A283 Court Bridge, Bramber

A scheme is currently being priced to replace the seals to the bridge half joints. Details of the traffic management required for the works and the planned start date will be announced in due course.