Plans
Overall strategy
Highway Maintenance in Bexley – Our Approach
Bexley’s highway maintenance practices take into consideration the national Well-managed Highway Infrastructure: Code of Practice, published in November 2018. This Code provides guidance to all local authorities on managing their road networks effectively. Each authority, including Bexley, is responsible for determining when a road or footway defect (such as a pothole) meets the criteria for action.
It is neither practical nor affordable to keep all roads and footways in a perfectly smooth, defect-free condition at all times. Instead, we apply recognised threshold measurements and risk-based assessments to decide which defects need repairs. This approach helps us maintain a safe and usable highway network in a cost-effective way.
Bexley has also modernised its operations in recent years by adopting new technologies and updated working methods. Examples include:
- Warm mix asphalt is now our standard material for resurfacing. It uses less energy during production and can be laid and reopened to traffic more quickly than traditional hot-mix asphalt
- We have introduced camera-based road scanning technology to assess surface condition. This complements our regular on foot inspections and helps prioritise work more efficiently
- The development of our FixMyStreet online reporting system, which handles around 16,000 reports each year. It offers an easy and quick way for residents and road users to report issues, and automatically forwards reports to the relevant council team, contractor, or external organisation improving response times and resolution
- We converted over 19,500 street lights to LED units, following public feedback that led us to reject part-time lighting trials. LED lighting provides clearer visibility, consumes less energy, lowers electricity bills, and requires less frequent maintenance
Bexley also maintains two full-time highway repair teams ("gangs") through our term maintenance contractor. These teams work every weekday across the borough, carrying out smaller-scale repairs and responding promptly to urgent issues.
To ensure public safety outside of normal hours, council technicians are on call during evenings and weekends all year round, to respond to urgent safety issues such as flooding, dangerous road defects, and emergencies involving police, fire services, or utility companies. If needed, contractors can be called out to either fix the problem immediately or make the area safe until full repairs can be completed.
Gritting/Salting (known as Winter Maintenance)
During the colder months (Autumn and Winter), we monitor weather conditions 24 hours a day using advanced forecasting services and local sensor data. This helps us assess when road surface temperatures are likely to fall below freezing and allow us to plan gritting operations in advance.
Bexley has 120 km (75 miles) of classified roads (A, B, and C roads) and 451 km (280 miles) of unclassified residential roads. In preparation for icy or snowy conditions, we operate two levels of precautionary gritting routes:
- A ‘short’ route, covering 34% of roads (195 km / 121 miles), used for precautionary gritting to keep key routes safe and accessible for essential services.
- A ‘long’ route, covering 42% of roads (239 km / 148 miles), used when freezing or snow is certain—providing greater protection to the wider road network and minimising disruption to residents and services.
- A ‘snow’ route, covering an additional 65 roads, treated only if the need arises during prolonged periods of settled snow.
- Hand salting undertaken in higher footfall areas during prolonged periods of snow.
In addition:
Providing grit/salt in salt bin across the borough to allow residents to ease problems in their roads, where they are not on one of the designated gritting routes.