Thanks for your response. On 25th Feb we were driving along the road in the reports highlighted above. Our side of the road was terrible, but the other side was indeed a death trap. The report dated 24th Feb says it all. n.b. that report (not mine btw) was closed on 26th Feb. I telephoned and spoke to a Council Official who explained the closure of the report was because the holes were fixed a while before. I told him he ought to view that road immediately or someone could be killed. His department's arrogance is unreal. I was telephoned later by one of his colleagues who said (because of my call and description) he was going to the road and would email me later. No Email was received. Further reports were made by victims on the first week of March, so and I emailed the official to ask if the road was now fixed but received no reply. The Cambridge Police just refer me to Highways and will not take action
I fear someone will be killed by Cambridge CC and then it will be too late. Their attitude (and that of the Police) is one of dismissal - Nobody seems to take responsibility! If the road is that bad it should be coned off (I'm not being dramatic - there were holes in both 'wheel tracks' that were about 2ft deep and 2ft across). We live in a broken Country.
It would go something like this:
1) Was the particular defect reported before? > if the answer is no:
a) is the defect of a size (mainly the depth of the hole) that would fall within the scope of an "actionable" defect"*?
If it it is not big/deep enough to be considered an actionable defect, then then you may only have recourse if an accident has been reported due to that defect before.
*So how big does an defect have to be before it is actionable? - well, this depends on the type of road (Ie, a county road in a rural area may be subject to lower standards than a main road or a busy street. As a rule of thumb though a hole that is approximately 1 to 2 inches deep will be considered actionable. The council usually have a policy in place for for size and depth, and should be able to disclose this.
b) did the council employ a reasonable system of inspection? The council should employ this, and it will require that the road/highway is inspected on a regular basis in order to identify "actionable" defects. Again, the frequency of the inspection will correspond to the type of road (as above) and will from part of the council's policy. Again they will usually disclose their policy on this if a legal claim is made,.
It's always worth looking on Google street view and selecting different years to see the history. This is because the council very often try to say they carried out inspections, but found nothing, but Google street view can show defects were clearly visible for months/years prior (this can show their inspections were not done properly (or they are simply lying).
NB: it's always good to take measurements as soon as the accident occurs, because if the council do repair the defect then it can be very tricky to prove how deep the hole was.
Forget about the police, it's not a criminal matter.
Unfortunately, I don't think the council will take complaints from the public very seriously - even as lawyers we have a hard time trying to prise
an admission of blame from them, even when we lay out the evidence and legal facts.
