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JCB backs Pothole Partnership to fix Britain’s roads

The JCB Pothole Pro takes on a traditional road gang in a race to fix potholes.

JCB has joined up with road user organisations to launch a ‘Pothole Partnership’ to tackle the potholes problem on UK roads.

The construction equipment manufacturer, together with the AA, British Cycling and the National Motorcyclist Council, sent their five-point pledge to help resolve the potholes issue to central and local government on 15 January – National Pothole Day.

A bars chart with pothole statistics. — (Credit: The AA)

The AA said that it dealt with 631,852 pothole-related incidents in 2023, the highest figure in five years. Pothole damage to vehicles cost £474m, according to figures released by the Pothole Partnership.

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The five-Ps Pothole Pledge

Permanent: Local authorities to limit the practice of temporary pothole repairs or patches and, where possible, every pothole or patch to be repaired permanently.
Precise: All local authorities/contractors to adhere to UK-wide repair and inspection standards, and report annually on the repairs undertaken.
Price: Government to demonstrate greater urgency by accelerating and increasing spending of the £8.3bn pothole funding for England in the first three years – with total clarity on the distribution to local authorities.
Provision: Central and local government to guarantee ringfencing of all road maintenance funding to help deliver innovations that enable permanent repairs.
Progress: Full transparency from local authorities on their roads repair backlog, categorised by potholes, patching works and road resurfacing.

Last year, JCB launched a machine, the JCB Pothole Pro, which can repair “a typical pothole” in eight minutes and cover 250 sq m per day, according to the company.

The machine is an adapted Hydradig wheeled excavator, equipped with all the tools needed to cut round a pothole and clean out. In addition to the tools the existing JCB Pothole Master has, the PotholePro also has a hydraulic cutting tool.

Stoke City Council was the first local authority to buy the machine in November 2021, having previously been involved with trials. JCB reports that the council has fixed 10,000 sq m in four months – an area which it says would take almost three years using traditional methods.