September 2009
An independent report into the maintenance of Scotland’s vital trunk roads and motorways has found that contractors are putting in a strong performance and continuing to improve services.
The report was published by Halcrow, who lead the Performance Audit Group commission for Transport Scotland. Halcrow’s expert team of engineers, supported by accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, carried out over almost 70 detailed audits of contractors BEAR, Amey and Scotland TranServ in 2008/09, as well as visiting over 1,000 road maintenance sites.
Donald Bell, Halcrow’s project director said:
“Our team travelled across Scotland throughout the year to visit routes, roadworks and depots, as well as monitoring the contractors’ management systems, to assess performance in maintaining these vital arteries. Our report examines 155 areas of performance and over 92% were found to be excellent, good or fair.”
Graham Edmond, Head of Network Maintenance for Transport Scotland, said:
“We have worked closely with PAG over the last year to continually monitor and improve the performance of our Operating Companies. We are pleased with the success of these efforts as reported in the Annual Report which we will jointly build on over the next year.”
The report notes particularly strong performance in health and safety, co-ordinating roadworks and dealing with emergencies. Using well-developed quality management systems, any areas for improvement in the contractors’ performance are monitored closely by the Performance Audit Group and Transport Scotland.
Donald Bell added:
“This strong performance reflects the culture of continuous improvement and teamwork developed by the contractors with Transport Scotland.”