Work is underway to repair rural and residential roads as part Dorset Council’s annual programme of surface dressing.
Surface dressing prolongs the life of roads by providing a waterproof seal, while also improving skid resistance. It forms a vital part of Dorset Highways’ annual road maintenance programme, alongside patching, micro-surfacing, in-situ recycling, road preservation and resurfacing.
This year, around 446,000m² of road will be restored with surface dressing as part of £16m of highway maintenance activity in the council area.
The work is carried out under a road closure, with on-street parking suspended to allow the work to take place.
This week (starting 11 July)
Surface dressing is being carried out between Winfrith Newburgh and Durdle Door with a road closure in place from 5am to 5pm each weekday. Please access Durdle Door from the east (West Lulworth).
Time permitting, when the above work has finished, our crew will move back into the Ferndown area at the end of the week:
Whincroft Drive, Ferndown
Woodside Road, Ferndown
Greenwood Avenue, Ferndown
Monkton Close, Ferndown
Week starting 18 July
Victoria Gardens, Ferndown
Penrose Road, Ferndown
St.Marys Road, Ferndown
Larch Way, Ferndown
Willow Way, Ferndown
Robins Wood Drive, Ferndown
Beaufoys Avenue, Ferndown
Queens Road, Ferndown
Prunus Drive, Ferndown
Laburnum Close, Ferndown
Aldridge Road, Ferndown
Lone Pine Way, Ferndown
Dane Drive, Ferndown
Lone Pine Drive, Ferndown
Winnards Close, West Parley
This rolling programme of surface dressing work started on 25 April and will last around three months.
What is surface dressing?
It is a quick process, with bitumen binder sprayed onto the road to seal it against water damage and stone chippings spread onto this to restore grip, with these compacted down with a roller.
Drivers can travel on the road as soon as the work is finished, with slow moving vehicles helping to further embed the stone chippings.
A sweeper travels along the road within 48 hours to clear any immediate surplus stone, with line markings reinstated shortly afterwards.
Surface dressing relies on the evaporation of water from the bitumen binder (glue) for it to set, so can only be carried out in dry weather.
As the work is highly weather dependent, residents are being asked to look out for yellow advance warning signs in their area which will provide the most accurate information.
Working times will be between the hours of 5am and 6pm. Work cannot take place at night due to the necessary evaporation process and will not be carried out over the weekend or on Bank Holidays.
White Lane Close, Sturminster Newton has recently been surface dressed. On the verge (lhs as you go in off Bath Road) two bags of chippings (or sweepings?) have been abandoned for several weeks. The bags have the name “Hanson Heidelberg Cement Group” on them. I have had a complaint about the bags from a resident of the road who knew I was once the County Council’s Area Surveyor (prior to 2020, long retired!!).
I have photographed the offending bags but can’t see how to attach a photo on my i-phone to this report.
When will Dorset start putting money into North Dorset: Blandford to Shaftesbury? The A350 is not fit for purpose – 6 places where two lorries cannot pass each other – not an A road at all. The C13 should be diverted south of Melbury Abbas to form an Eastern bypass for Shaftesbury, first mooted in the 1930’s! All the money seems to go to South Dorset.
When are they going to do Holloway Road in Fordington Dorchester? We had notices to move our cars out of the way for a day a few weeks ago and nothing was done.
Once again, Weyview Crescent has been ignored for surface dressing and pothole repair. I have lost count of the number of times its lack of road maintenance has been reported and ignored. The last time this road had any major maintenance is well over 10 years ago. There huge areas of missing top dressing and bearing in mind that we are on a hill, grip is at a minimum. We pay a considerable sum in Council Tax and appear to get nothing for it. Action please!
ellesfield drive is a busy road especially during school time and
is in need of repair
What has happened to the resurfacing of Allenview in Wimborne? We were given notice that it would be very soon but the board has disappeared. It was originally scheduled over a year ago if I remember correctly, but that never happened either.
Very pleased to see some of the work has been carried out to repair the appalling state of Victoria Gardens, Ferndown. However , when can we expect completion? That is to say, When will the loose chippings be cleared as they are being pushed into the gutters, down the drains, onto the pavements and residents driveways. Furthermore ,how can road markings be applied to a light grey surface? Will you, also, be enforcing the 20 mph speed restriction for the boy and girl racers are still treating this road as if it is the finishing straight at Silverstone?
Not impressed with the “patching”at end of Matlock Rd in Ferndown.Still a very bumpy start to the road.Needed a proper job!
It would appear that I am not alone with regard to the standard of the ‘Surface Dressing’ programme. Glissons had surface dressing applied on 29th June 2022 and has had no further action (sweeping, making good etc) since that date. I have raised the issue on the main Dorset site and still had no actual response. The only action that has been undertaken are the painting of Give Way road markings and very shaky double yellow lines at the entrance to the street. Utilities access points are still buried under the tarmac dressing in the road making them inaccessible.