Cornwall Council is changing the way it manages and maintains the road network in Cornwall to take account of the lessons learned from the inquest into the death of Susan Norman in Looe and the new National Code of Practice for Managing Highways Infrastructure. 

The revised Highway Maintenance Manual, which will be introduced from April, follows a comprehensive review of the Council’s highway service in the light of the conclusions set out in the Record of Inquest and the new national code of practice published by the Government in October 2016.

The council manages 7,300km of roads, 4,300km of footpaths and nearly 900 public open spaces across Cornwall as well as bridges, street lights and signals. 

The total value of these assets is more than £8billion and is the single most valuable public asset managed by the authority.

The Record of Inquest, published immediately following the inquest in November 2016, identified a number of specific issues, including the failure of the Council to consider the evidence of historic landslips and the independent report highlighting risk and to listen to complaints from local residents.

The revised Highways Maintenance Manual, which was approved by members at last week’s Cabinet meeting, sets out new ways of assessing and prioritising information about defects and potential risks on the road network managed by the Council and on privately owned land next to the highway. 

This includes inspecting retaining walls and embankments which could affect adjacent landowners, with new rules for the building control service aiming to ensure concerns about privately owned structures such as walls are responded to quickly.

The review also found no one central point of contact responsible for prioritising or responding effectively to queries or problems.  

As a result the council is setting up a new Cornwall Highways Customer Centre which will handle all queries relating to highways issues, with a new management system to enable enquiries to be prioritised and tracked from the start to the finish of the process.

The Council will also be working with Cormac to revise its existing contract to make sure that the changes can be operated efficiently.