I. What was the total cost to Devon County Council of the use of temporary traffic lights and road signage throughout the Devon area of which Devon County Council has responsibility? This is for the 2017/2018 financial year and from April 2018 until 12 July 2018 which is the date of this application.
Please see response to question 2 below.
2. What percentage of Devon County Council’s finances are used for temporary traffic lights, and other road signage, on the roads of Devon? For example, what % of the Council Tax paid to Devon County Council is used on average, or in the 2017/2018 financial year specifically?
Unfortunately, Devon County Council (DCC) is unable to supply you with the information requested in questions 1 and 2 under Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act which states that public authorities are not obliged to comply with requests which exceed the cost limit of £450 (equating to 18 hours of time).
Whilst the information you have requested does sit within our electronic and paper filing systems, these systems are not set up to easily provide us with the type of information you have requested as this is not the sort of information we would need for our own day to day business purposes.
In order to locate, retrieve and extract the requested information, DCC would need to review each individual works order. We have estimated that this would take well in excess of the 18 hours public authorities are required to spend responding to FOI requests.
However, information relating to the deployment of traffic signals and associated signing and guarding to make the highway safe prior to the start of works to maintain the highway could be provided if this would be helpful.
Please refer to our website here – https://www.devon.gov.uk/finance-and-budget/council-tax/ for details of how your Council Tax is spent.
3. What has been the total cost of the temporary traffic lights installed at Eggesford from summer 2017, when the carriageway collapsed until the road was closed for repair in June 2018? Was this paid for by Devon County Council or by a grant?
£13,595.44. The initial set up and maintenance until December 2017 was paid from Devon County Council revenue highway maintenance budget (£5,348.59). The expected costs from December until completion of the works to construct a new retaining wall and repair the carriageway (£8,246.85) will be paid as part of the scheme costs from capital funding for Highway and Bridge maintenance, which is a grant from central government.
4. What is the expected cost of current repairs to the road at Eggesford which is due to open again in August 2018?
The expected cost for the repair works on the A377 at Eggesford is £183,593.54.
This includes all preliminary investigations, design, construction and supervision.
This does not include the costs detailed in our response to question 3 above.