Time line set out for adopting roads
PEOPLE buying homes on new estates in West Lancashire could soon get an indication of how long it might take for the roads outside their properties to be adopted.
But residents will still receive no guarantee about when the process will be completed – or if it will happen at all.
Until a new road is completed to an acceptable standard, it is not eligible to be maintained by Lancashire County Council, which is the highways authority.
Adoption usually takes about five years from when construction of a development begins.
County Hall is now set to recommend that a condition is included when developers are granted planning permission, laying out an indicative time line for the process – and reflecting the specific phases of individual developments.
It would be for district councils such as West Lancashire to decide – as the county’s planning authorities – whether such a condition should be attached.
But a meeting of the county council’s internal scrutiny committee heard that neither the county nor district councils have any powers to force house builders to offer their roads for adoption.
Neil Stevens, the authority’s highways development control manager, said that most “mainstream” developers do want to be able to hand over the highways which they build to the county council – which would then become responsible for their upkeep.
“I’m trying to provide certainty to those residents [about] a time line for that adoption process,” he said.
But the proposal drew a mixed response from committee members. County Cllr Erica Lewis, herself a resident of an unadopted road, said that she was not sure of the point of the plan.
“What [residents] want is for their road to be adopted,” she said.
However, fellow committee member John Fillis – a former cabinet member for highways at the authority and a councillor for Skelmersdale East – said that the condition could bring clarity for potential purchasers about what they could expect after they move in to their new homes.
“Local planning authorities can [include a line in the planning conditions] that, if a road is to be adopted, a time line should be agreed with the highways authority. If [the developer] doesn’t agree to that, it can be taken out – but then the solicitors working for the house purchasers will see that [omission] and can then ask the question, ‘How come you will not have this road adopted?’” Cllr Fillis said.
“If the line is [included], but the builder then doesn’t have the road adopted, then there is a clear course of action [which could] be taken [by the homeowner],” he added.
County council officers will now draw up the exact wording of the condition to be recommended for use by district authorities as part of the planning process.
County Cllr Steve Holgate said that the current ambiguity on the part of some developers about when – or whether – their roads would be adopted was tantamount to selling houses “under false pretences”.
“The expectation is very high that at some point the local authority will adopt [these new roads], but there is nothing in place to suggest that – and nobody is telling [the] purchasers.
“In time, that [problem] usually gets dumped on our doorstep and becomes a reputational issue for the authority – and I don’t think that’s fair,” County Cllr Holgate said.