Bury Council have vowed to finish the road resurfacing works after contractors avoided areas with parked cars. The residents in Prestwich were left baffled last week after they came home to see work resurfacing works ‘half-done’ on their street.
The initial layer of gravel was put down successfully and the notices to remove cars from the street had been taken down - meaning Brandram Road dwellers thought it was fine to park their cars there. They were caught unawares, though, when the workers returned and put a sticky resin [liquid bitumen] on top of the gravel to hold it in place, avoiding the areas where cars were parked.
Residents were left bemused when they returned home. One man, 74-year-old Stewart Lomas, was confident the council’s contractors would return to finish what they started.
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The council has now confirmed that the work is all complete bar one space where a car remained - which will be completed today.
“I was away for two hours and I came back to this,” he said last week. “I thought I was in the clear because they put the signs down.
“I was worried about the clippings because it’s a contract car I have, when I saw this coating I saw it got rid of the clippings which is good. I am not complaining about that.
“I think they are going to come and finish it. I am hoping so. It’s a half done job. Not fit for purpose.
“If the street was all done it would not look that bad. There are other streets that still need doing.
“Everyone likes the top coat but we just need it across the whole road. I think they were just filling the time they had here, it was not for cost cutting purposes I don’t think.”
The council has since confirmed that the majority has been done bar one spot, which will be completed today (Thursday).
All the residents who spoke to the Manchester Evening News said that the road was in need of repair and the resurfacing treatment was welcomed. But they said that the incident that occurred at the end of last week was ‘strange’ and ‘half-done’.
“There were notices on the posts for no parking,” one resident reacted. “I think everyone parked with a car did move them.
“They put the gravel/shail stuff down and then took the notices off so we all thought it was done. Then we came back and they had squirted this stuff on it.
“If it was all like that it would be great. It’s messy as well [the gravel] because it gets everywhere.
“It was a surprise because nobody knew this was going to happen. It was in the afternoon that it happened and I was out and I came back to it like that.
“If they left them notices up people would’ve moved their cars. It is strange, it just looks half done.
“The bit that is done looks good, if it was all like that it would be great. But it is not.”
Now the council has just one last spot to complete, they have promised to make sure residents are better informed of works in the future.
“The contractors have been back, and almost all the work has been completed,” a spokesman said. “The final bit, where there was one parked car, will be completed today.
"We’re spending a lot of money improving the roads. In our budget this year, we agreed to invest a further £10 million into the borough’s highways, taking the total to £30 million over nine years.”
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