Friary Park, Claims & Potholes

Data Tables (2)

Full Response Text

Department of Infrastructure Sea Terminal Building, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 2RF

FOI Reference No: IM72213I Request Under The Freedom Of Information Act 2015 (“The Act”)

Thank you for your request dated 3rd January 2017

Your request (with clarification from you shown in italics)

1. How many complaints and reports of potholes have been made of the area, Friary Park, Ballabeg? 1st January 2015 to date
2. How many claims have been made for compensation? for Friary Park only
3. How many claims have you met and how much has the DOI paid out? for Friary Park only
4. How much has been spent by DOI on resurfacing and fixing pot-holed roads in 2011/2012 and 2012/2013;
5. For the year April 2016/March 2017, has the DOI cut its budget for maintaining roads to 'emergency-only' levels? (Yes or no question);
6. How many claims for compensation were lodged by drivers as a result of damage to their car due to the poor state of the roads to the DOI in 2015/2016 and 2016/2017; claims via the Department’s insurers
7. How much has DOI paid out to drivers in compensation due to the poor state of the roads in in 2015/2016 and 2016/2017; claims via the Department’s insurers
8. Does the DOI temporarily fixes potholes rather than relay road surfaces yes or no question (yes we temporarily fix / or no we relay);
9. How often the average road is fully re-surfaced (in years); want to find the difference between main roads and Friary Park – surface replacement, rather than pothole filling
10. When a report is made via the DOI webpage, what procedure is in place to deal with each report and how long does the member of the public wait for the issue to be fixed if it is non- urgent.

Response to your request

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested; the reasons and statutory exemption sections are shown as part of the corresponding answers below.

1. Friary Park Area – Pot Holes ID No Date Location Completion 70102 8/2/16 Outside 2&3 Friary Park 8/2/16 69775 15/1/16 Outside 3&4 Friary Park 8/2/16 69489 4/1/16 Friary Park 4/1/16 68974 9/11/15 Friary Park Road speed bump Within 24 hrs 67871 1/7/15 Friary Park Road Within 24 hrs 67116 24/3/15 Friary Park Road Within 24 hrs 60942 15/3/15 Friary Park Road Within 24 hrs 46351 3/4/15 Friary Park Road Between Junctions with Ballanorris Close Within 24 hrs 70091 8/2/16 Grey Friars Entrance to Close Within 24 hrs 80382 15/1/15 Friary Park 3 & 4 Within 24 hrs 80673 24/3/15 Friary Park Road Within 24 hrs Total 11

2. There have been no claims made for compensation because of potholes within Friary Park, Ballabeg. However you may be interested to know that there were three claims made along the main road, within the Parish.

3. As the answer to question 2 is ‘none’, there is no information to provide.

4. Under sections 11(2)(b) of the Act (practical refusal reason, referencing s8(3) whilst there is some information held by the Department, the Act states that:

“a public authority is not required to: create or derive information from information that it holds; undertake research into, or analysis of, information that it holds; or undertake substantial compilation or collation of information that it holds”

We do not record information in a format that allows us to answer your question. What I can provide and which may be of interest to you are approximate costs detailed below 2011/2012 Costs 2012/2013 Costs Undefined emergency – which included things like filling potholes, repairing kerbs &/or signs. £146,231 Undefined emergency – which included filling potholes, repairing kerbs &/or signs £150,118 Patching Carriageway
£1,129,954 Patching Carriageway
£1,064,217 Surface Dressing £1,116,083 Surface Dressing £882,604 Other Surface Treatment – slurry
£110,938 Other Surface Treatment - slurry £93,987

1. No, the Department has not cut its budget to emergency levels.

2. There were 20 insurance claims lodged during 2015/2016, and there have been 19 claims to date for 2016/2017.

3. Under sections 11(3)(a) of the Act (practical refusal) , in this instance the Department does not hold or cannot, after taking reasonable steps to do so, find any specific information to answer your question. This is because, on receipt of a claim it is passed immediately to our Insurers.
   After that, we have no further involvement with the process and are not party to any information on the resolution of the claim or payments which may be made. Treasury may hold the information you are after.

4. Yes the Department temporarily fills potholes until such time as a more permanent repair can be programmed.

5. The Department does not have a programme for resurfacing the “average” road because all roads deteriorate at very different rates and differ in importance. Many factors have a bearing on the rate of deterioration of our roads;

 Volume of traffic  Weight of vehicles  Adverse weather – wind, rain, ice and snow  The existing make up of a road  Condition and effectiveness of drainage  Root, vegetation growth  How often services (electric, gas, water, drainage and telecom) have to gain access to their equipment and the quality of their reinstatements.

1. The Departments procedure for dealing with webpage enquires is:

Report of an issue is received via email, report a problem application, telephone or in person

Report is logged onto Symology (data storage software) as soon as the report has been made it is assigned to the relevant Parish Warden for the area in which the issue is located

Parish warden fixes or makes safe within 24 hours of receiving
the works request

Parish warden notifies control when the job has been completed

Job is closed off on Symology or assigned to engineer if further works are required in order that it can be scheduled into their programme

Non-urgent issues will be assessed, prioritised and added to a programme of work. Depending on numerous factors it could be dealt with any time from 24hrs to 2 years.

Your right to request a review

If you are unhappy with this response to your Freedom of Information request, you may ask us to carry out an internal review of the response, by completing a complaint form and submitting it electronically to foi.doi@gov.im or by delivery/post to Mr Ian Harris, Department of Infrastructure, Sea Terminal Buildings, Douglas, IM1 2RF. An electronic version of our complaint form can be found by going to our website at https://www.gov.im/about-the-government/freedom-of-information/ or a paper version can be supplied on request.

Your review request should explain why you are dissatisfied with this response, and should be made as soon as practicable. We will respond as soon as the review has been concluded.

If you are not satisfied with the result of the review, you then have the right to appeal to the Information Commissioner for a decision on;

1. Whether we have responded to your request for information in accordance with Part 2 of the Freedom of Information Act; or

2. Whether we are justified in refusing to give you the information requested.

In response to an application for review, the Information Commissioner may, at any time, attempt to resolve a matter by negotiation, conciliation, mediation or another form of alternative dispute resolution and will have regard to any outcome of this in making any subsequent decision.

More detailed information on your rights to review is on the Information Commissioner’s website at: www.inforights.im/

Should you have any queries concerning this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Further information about Freedom of Information requests can be found at https://www.gov.im/about-the-government/freedom-of-information/