THE list of priorities for re-surfacing and repairing roads riddled with pot holes has been questioned by residents after Surrey County Council published a list of schemes under its Operation Horizon banner.

A total of 177 roads in the county have been lined up to for reconstruction this financial year – year three of the council’s five year Operation Horizon project – with 642 due for overhaul over the following two financial years in a £100m initiative.

Surrey says the roads due to be resurfaced will be guaranteed ‘pothole proof’ leaving contractors to pick up the bill if their work is not up to standard. But Department for Transport funding for the county is still more than £40m short of the £125m needed to maintain the county’s roads for the next five years.

But residents waiting for their roads to be repaired are questioning the criteria used when the list was drawn up, when some roads less damaged than others being given priority, and have called for the list to be reviewed.

Haslemere resident David Silk said in a letter to The Herald that Lion Lane had been repaired recently, after being resurfaced only two or three years ago, whereas there were a lot more roads in the county in a terrible state requiring resurfacing.

Mr Silk said: “As I see it, the only beneficiaries will be the ‘Chelsea tractors‘ that use the road as a race track, just gliding over the speed humps as though they weren’t there. I wonder just how much this re-surfacing cost has cost us council taxpayers?”

Former Haslemere town councillor Fay Foster wrote saying Blackdown Lane – used as a “rat run” – was now left off the Surrey’s list of roads needing attention.

Although it had originally been on the priority list, only half the length of a new surface originally promised has now been done.

“Residents in the region of Blackdown Lane are very annoyed that work on their appalling potholes has been removed from the lists of roads needing early attention,” she said.

Money was originally earmarked for Haste Hill to cover 1,000 metres of road. At that time the steep and winding Blackdown Lane was unnamed and was included in the length of work proposed for Haste Hill.

“In the meantime, once the new name was allocated, it seems Surrey highways used the new status to renege on their commitment and are now saying it may be ‘several years’ before any work can be done.

“There was money budgeted for 1,000 metres of road. They resurfaced the 500 metres of Haste Hill – which was in far better repair than Blackdown Lane – and so one must ask where the leftover money has been used?

“Blackdown Lane is used extensively as a rat-run to avoid the town centre for people coming from the Fernhurst direction towards the A287 at Chiddingfold. Recently it is even more crowded due to the chaos caused by the installation of railings opposite Barclays Bank.”

She added the road had not been touched for around 20 years or so.

Mrs Foster added: “The lane is very steep and winding and the surface is loose and extremely dangerous for the many cars and cycles who now use it.”

“Despite the best efforts of our county councillor to plead for action, it appears the status quo must continue. But the question remains – how on earth do Surrey work out their priorities? Their criteria certainly do not appear to be road safety. Do they just listen to those who shout loudest?”