The Hills Shire Council has approved additional funds for its road maintenance and renewals budget, making this year’s budget the biggest yet.
Council’s road asset maintenance and renewal budget will increase by another $1.7 million to carryout urgent repairs and tackle the growing number of potholes across various Hills Shire roads that were brought on by the record-breaking wet weather.
“With our third consecutive La Nina, it has been a very wet few years – and all across NSW, this is causing a deterioration in the quality of the road network,” Mayor of The Hills Shire, Dr Peter Gangemi said.
“Council has allocated an increased budget to repair our road network to a high standard and our crews are working hard to respond to requests to repair potholes and road damage.
“We are aware that road condition is a top priority in our Shire right now and we are doing everything we can to repair roads as fast as possible,” Mayor Gangemi added.
Pothole repairs and requests have increased over the past three years. In 2019, Council received 1680 calls to fix potholes and carryout road patching work. This has now grown to 4783 requests in 2022 – and the year has two months to go.
“This represents a 185 per cent increase, which is just phenomenal,” Mayor Gangemi said.
“We are working to attend to all requests, but there are roads that still require attention, particularly in our rural north, which have been impacted by multiple floods over the past two years.
“Council is attending to these roads, however, some will require significant work to repair the damage that was caused by these natural disasters,” Mayor Gangemi added.
Mayor Gangemi said Council will make a submission to the joint Australian Government State Disaster Recovery Funding grant program to try and recover costs directly attributed to these floods.
In addition to this, Council successfully secured $458,071 under Transport for NSW’s Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangement to carryout rehabilitation and drainage improvement works on Halcrows Road, in Cattai after it sustained damage when it was used as a detour road in the July 2022 flood. Council has also committed approximately $292,000 to this project and is working with contractors to find the best solution to fix this road as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, with more rain set to continue until the La Nina weather system weakens in December, Mayor Gangemi is encouraging residents – “if you see a pothole, please use the ‘Report it to Council’ webpage located on Council’s website [www.thehills.nsw.gov.au]. That way Council is aware of the pothole and we can send crews to remedy this issue,” he said.
“I also want to thank residents for their patience and understanding, and encourage them to remain vigilant, take care on our roads and slow down when they see hazards, road works and while driving through heavy periods of rain,” he added.
Roads that have received additional funding beyond the amounts already scheduled for this financial year include:
- $750,000 for Halcrows Road, Glenorie;
- $464,000 for Pitt Town Road, Kenthurst;
- $394,000 for Withers Road, North Kellyville;
- $180,000 for Diana Avenue, Kellyville;
- $111,000 for Macquarie Avenue, Kellyville;
- $103,000 for Box Road, Box Hill;
- $90,000 for Balmoral Road, Kellyville;
- $89,000 for Harrington Avenue, Kellyville;
- $60,000 for Maguires Road, Maraylya;
- $48,000 for Palace Road, Baulkham Hills;
- $46,000 for Maple Street, Dural;
- $46,000 for Windsor Road, Baulkham Hills;
- $45,000 for Hyde Avenue and Sylvan Grove, Glenhaven; and
- $20,000 for Barry Road and Stringer Road, North Kellyville.
