ALARM survey

27/03/2025

For this month’s special podcast, Dominic Browne and Chris Ames meet David Giles and Ian Lancaster of the Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) to discuss the AIA’s 2025 Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey and find their way through the smoke and mirrors of highways maintenance funding.

21/03/2025

A key figure behind this week’s headline-grabbing survey of local roads has said it is ‘disgusting’ that the country has allowed the network to reach its current state.

18/03/2025

The backlog of carriageway repairs in England and Wales has reached almost £17bn, with roads only being resurfaced every 93 years on average, according to the road industry's flagship survey.

04/10/2024

Exclusive research by the Asphalt Industry Alliance and LCRIG in the annual ALARM survey has uncovered a wide gap between action and intention when it comes to decarbonising local road maintenance.

19/03/2024

The carriageway repair bill for local roads in England and Wales has reached a record high of £16.3bn – double the promised £8bn funding uplift from the Government.

18/05/2023

Our local roads are in a state of emergency, with a record maintenance backlog of £14bn. Highways magazine talks to two of TotalEnergies' leading experts Richard Ashton and Gary Schofield about how we rescue this situation and pull ourselves back from the brink.

21/03/2023

This year's annual ALARM survey delivered a bruising result: with a record maintenance backlog of £14bn, senior figures across the industry called for a change of strategy and long-term funding.

21/03/2023

The local roads maintenance backlog in England and Wales has hit a record £14bn, an increase of 11%.

21/03/2022

The cost of the 'pothole backlog’ across England and Wales has jumped by nearly 25% in the last 12 months from £10.24bn to £12.64bn, in a major warning sign of the devastating impact of inflation on the highways sector.

21/01/2021

Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) chair Rick Green calls on councils to participate in the 2021 ALARM survey so highways maintenance gets the public and political attention it deserves.

30/03/2020

29/03/2020

26/03/2019

The Department for Transport has given details of how councils are spending extra £420m the for local road maintenance announced in the Budget, including repairing a historic bridge.

26/03/2019

Dominic Browne meets Rick Green, managing director of Hanson Contracting and chairman of the Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA), which has just published its annual ALARM survey.

26/03/2019

Recent increases in local authority highway maintenance budgets appear to be stemming the decline of local roads, according to the publishers of the 24th Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey.

02/11/2018

Two key figures in the highway maintenance industry have said the Budget announcement of a £420m cash boost for councils should lead to a significant long-term increase in funding for local roads.

23/03/2018

Steve Gooding, former director at the Department for Transport and current director of the RAC Foundation, argues that highway maintenance still does not get the support it deserves.

20/03/2018

This year’s ALARM survey has recorded a triumphant headline result for local authorities in England and Wales with the estimated highways maintenance backlog falling by almost 23% this year to £9.31bn from £12.06bn.

23/03/2016

Local roads are deteriorating at a faster rate than they can be repaired, according to Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) chairman Alan Mackenzie. The findings of the latest Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey reveal that the estimated cost to get the local road network in England and Wales back into reasonable condition is at almost £12 billion.