Minutes:
(1) The Interim Director gave an oral update on some of the key issues and developments in KHS, as follows:-
(a) Staffing
Members would be aware that since the last HAB, John Hobbs had been unable to continue his work as Director of Highways Improvement for personal reasons.
We were enjoying a period of stability and were starting to reap the benefits of this – staff had welcomed job security and morale was improving. However, she recognised that many staff were still reeling from the significant change over the last four years, and she had some way to go to ensure that all staff felt happy and valued. This was understandably one of her key priorities.
(b) Transformation
We were now nearing the end of the implementation of technology planned during transformation – with streetlighting moving from their Mayrise system to the WAMS/Confirm software during January and February. Additionally Job Smart was being implemented and this would improve the programming of maintenance work and visibility of the status of fault repair to KHS staff and the Contact Centre – which would enable us to provide more information to the public about when a fault would be resolved.
A site for the West Kent depot was being actively pursued and she hoped to be able to share more details over the course of the next few months.
(c) Journey times into Maidstone
Anecdotally we had heard from a number of stakeholders - members, traders, bus operators - about the positive effect of the Traffic Management Centre and technology on journey times into Maidstone – and importantly the reliability of those journeys. We now had data to evidence this improvement with journeys taking on average 3.5 minutes per mile in the peak run up to Christmas against a baseline in 2007 of 4.2 minutes per mile.
(d) Winter service
With the cold snap greeting the New Year it was timely to give an update on the winter service, but members would be aware that preparation for winter starts in October and might have seen the press coverage or heard radio interviews with one of the supervisors for the salting teams.
Coverage was on 30% of the road network with 53 salting routes and 64 vehicles carried out salting duties. Salt was kept throughout the county for use by those vehicles. Additionally 250 snow ploughs were held by farmers in rural areas and these had been serviced ready for action.
Salting runs were up by about 50% on this time last year.
As at 5 January, between 10,000 and 12,000 tonnes of salt was held in depots with further deliveries later in the week. Members would also recall that we had started to use pre-wet salt (which basically improved stickability of the salt) and a report on this in the early summer was planned as part of the annual winter maintenance report to HAB which would be brought forward from September.
(e) LED programme
The programme to replace all traffic light heads with LED technology was on track to be delivered by 31 March this year. As at mid December 332 sites had been completed with a further 180 sites remaining and 67 sites having some technical issues. It was understood this replacement programme was to be a first nationally, and the benefits would be reviewed over the course of 09/10.
We were looking at the potential for LED streetlights in due course, but this was something we would need to evaluate over the course of the next few years.
(f) Reactive maintenance work
Along with improving staff morale, this was a key priority – getting the basics right. It would be fair to say that the new technology and working practices we had implemented had taken longer to bed down than was originally thought, and this had led to a loss of confidence by some in the service. We were all working very hard to turn this round, and the massive commitment that teams were demonstrating day in day out was acknowledged.
Members and parish colleagues had started to see the benefits of the community liaison officers and the direct contact that many had with them. Members were urged to report routine faults through the Contact Centre so that the liaison officers had time to support them for JTBs, parish work or when issues needed to be escalated.
In terms of fault resolution, we aimed to resolve basic faults such as potholes, signage and so on within 21 days of the fault being reported. In many district areas we were delivering well on this. In two or three areas more faults were being raised and there was a small backlog. We were receiving about 800 fault reports per week from the public which were being resolved alongside the faults picked up through the routine safety inspections.
Overall, there were currently 3,500 jobs still outstanding over 21 days, against a high of 7,500 in October. Many of the outstanding jobs had in fact been completed and there was a big push to update the systems. Job Smart would again help with this as the system would update automatically once a job had been completed.
Operational performance data was reviewed weekly by team leaders and managers on a weekly basis at team and service group level.
(2) The Board:-
(a) noted the report;
(b) agreed that, in future, a written report be submitted; and
(c) requested an occasional report from the Cabinet Member for Environment, Highways and Waste.