Reading Borough Council has announced £9 million to resurface hundreds of roads in the town.

Work to resurface the roads begins on 02 October 2020 in the first phase of the scheme.

The first 63 roads to be improved under the scheme will be completed by the end of March 2021. Hundreds more roads across Reading will benefit from surfacing improvements taking place over the next three years in response to residents' calls for better roads.

A Citizens Panel survey conducted by the Council in November 2018 revealed that over 50% of respondents listed 'better roads and pavements' as top of their lists for improvements, and the Council has responded with the biggest programme of resurfacing it has ever undertaken.

The £9m investment from Reading Borough Council is focused on residential side roads, and will complement additional resurfacing work funded by the Department of Transport on major arterial routes throughout the Borough.

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Reading Borough Council is hoping that from March, dependent on social distancing rules, it will be able to operate a new and novel engagement programme. This will allow local residents to find out more about the programme on selected roads by meeting the team doing the resurfacing, learning how the process works and discovering how this fits into the wider scheme of road improvements across the borough.

Cllr Tony Page, Reading Borough Council's Lead Member for Strategic Environment, Planning and Transport, said: "The views of our residents are of paramount importance to us, and something that came through clearly from them was a desire for better roads in the town. Despite challenging times economically, we are delighted to reveal that tens of thousands of our residents, in hundreds of streets and across all wards, will benefit from our £9m residential road improvement scheme which begins on 2 October."

The first phase of the road improvement scheme will be undertaken by our contractor Eurovia Infrastructure Ltd. Advance notice boards will go up on the roads to be resurfaced and residents will receive a letter 2-3 days before the work is carried out. Roads will be closed between 8am and 5pm for the improvements to safely take place, with cars needing to vacate the roads in advance. Any parked vehicles will be liable for a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) and will be removed. After a 1-2 week period when the roads will seem rough and gravelly whilst they are left to settle, the roads will be closed again so the contractor can return to sweep the road and paint the road markings on the new surface, leaving smooth new residential road surfaces across the borough.