Councillors have agreed to take forward an ambitious suite of infrastructure and road safety works in the coming year, worth over £30m.
The Roads and Infrastructure Investment – Capital Delivery Priorities for 2025/26 spreads the capital budget of £25.686m across six different work streams.
Carriageways and footways will receive £18.161m and focus on repairing roads and pavements. Street lighting and traffic signals have £1.220m, which will be used to maintain and improve this network. Road structures take £1.545m and focusses on our road bridges, foot bridges, underpasses, tunnels and gantries. Our road operations will get £2.460m and encompasses drainage repairs, bus stop maintenance and surface enhancement. Other asset management and miscellaneous spending amounts to £2.3m.
The additional £12.5m of funding agreed in February’s budget has been integrated into the programme to improve paths, pavements and road conditions. An extra £12.5m of funding was also agreed last year, with a record 460,000m2 of carriageways and 52,000m2 of footways receiving treatment in that period. The Council’s Road Condition Indicator (RCI), which signifies the percentage of roads that should be considered for investment, also saw a significant improvement in 2024/25.
We’ll look to build on these results in the coming year by undertaking a combination of carriageway strengthening, carriageway resurfacing, carriageway surface treatment, footway asphalt, footway flags and footway slurry sealing.
The report also outlines our Street Lighting Programme and looks further ahead to our Setted Street Priorities in the next six financial years with Frederick Street, Victoria Street and the Shore all featuring for refurbishment.
Our Road Safety Delivery Plan 2025/26 allocates over £6m across the service. As part of this, the Road Safety team will address concerns around the Dalmahoy Junction and prioritise infrastructure improvements for safe school travel, including additional pedestrian crossings.
There will also be provision for Accident Investigation and Prevention (AIP), speed reduction measures and new 30mph and 20mph speed limit reductions over this and the forthcoming year. A full breakdown can be found in Appendix 2 of the report. Road safety progress will be reported to Committee in October, following elected member workshops to drive forward existing priority projects.
These allocations are driven by our main priorities in the year ahead to promote road safety, study road accidents, review our vacant school crossing sites, take preventative measures and offer information, advice and practical training to road users.
Transport and Environment Convener, Councillor Stephen Jenkinson said:
I’m really pleased that these two ambitious and wide-reaching reports have been agreed.
Our residents have made it abundantly clear that they want and expect continued investment in our roads network. Road safety also goes hand in hand with road condition and investment, with roads that are better maintained equalling safer roads for our children and young people. This is what I’m committed to delivering.
From carriageway strengthening in Corstorphine and surface treatment in Seafield, to street lighting in Leith and road safety education in Ratho, we’re focussed on fulfilling our commitments and getting to work for the people of Edinburgh.
A list of definitions for treatment specifications mentioned above in the Roads and Infrastructure Investment – Capital Delivery Priorities for 2025/26 report are below.
Carriageway Strengthening: A substantial treatment with a minimum depth of 100mm. This includes removal of the surfacing and base course of the carriageway. Deeper excavations may be required depending on existing condition. Deeper excavations are required a bus stops.
Carriageway Resurfacing: This treatment removes the surface course only. The depth of treatment is generally 40-50mm.
Carriageway Surface Treatment: A preventative maintenance treatment. A thin treatment that is designed to slow deterioration of the carriageway. It is used primarily on carriageways that are starting to deteriorate. CEC uses two surface treatments: Surface Dressing and Micro Asphalt.
Footway Asphalt: Break out of the existing asphalt footway. Depth will be dependent on existing condition. Kerbs are generally lifted and re-set as part of this treatment.
Footway Flags: Break out of the existing footway with flags (slabs) being installed. Generally, pre-cast concrete flags are used, however, the following material is specified in the World Heritage Site: Old Town: Caithness Stone Flags New Town: Yorkstone Flags
Footway Surface Treatment: A preventative maintenance treatment. A thin treatment that is designed to slow deterioration of the footway.