MORE than 10,00 potholes were recorded on Carmarthenshire’s roads last year, nearly twice the number than in 2023.

Pothole numbers averaged around 2,000 per year for a while in the county before climbing in 2022 and then again in 2023 when they reached 6,055.

The recorded figure for 2024 was 10,114.

“The increase in potholes is as a result of sustained low levels of investment in preventative maintenance,” said a highway asset management plan which was discussed by a council scrutiny committee.

“This trend is expected to continue as the long-term impacts of under-investment results in further road deterioration.”

The asset plan said the road maintenance backlog now stood at £77 million.

Cllr Gareth Thomas said the report made “very difficult reading”. Chris Nelson, the council’s highway asset manager, attributed some of the increase in recorded potholes to improved reporting.

The asset plan said there was no Welsh Government grant for road repairs in 2024-25 and no indication of one for 2025-26 as yet. The council is, however, working on a bid for a different Welsh Government pot of money called the resilient roads fund.

The asset plan said the council needed to spend £8 million per year to maintain the road network, which is the second largest of Wales’s 22 local authority areas, in a “stand-still” condition.

In 2023-24 the council spent £1.6 million of capital funding on road maintenance, and £1.3 million of revenue funding on patching and repairs. Its expenditure on roads and transport, said the report, was the second lowest per kilometre in Wales. Based on current funding levels, the proportion of roads estimated to be in a poor condition in Carmarthenshire is predicted to increase from 10 per cent currently to 23 per cent in a decade’s time.

The asset plan also said 18 per cent of surveyed road drains were blocked or compromised in some way, while 7% had major defects or were not fit for purpose.

Pothole repair work has been stepped up though, with teams fixing nearly 4,400 defects between October 2023 and March 2024. The council has also made savings by revising its winter gritting regime, cutting gritter numbers from 13 to 11, and spreading less road salt.

And it has used recycled nappies in the form of pellets in some road schemes, which the asset plan said didn’t add to costs but did deliver environmental benefits. Meanwhile the number of bridges deemed to be sub-standard reduced from 47 to 43 in 2023-24.

Members of the council’s place, sustainability and climate change scrutiny committee praised the highways department for its work given the budgetary constraints.

But councillors were worried about cuts to road sweeping and gully cleaning that are planned as part of wider savings measures for 2025-26. Another proposal is to stop additional street cleaning work which takes place in Tyisha, Llanelli.

Council chiefs have set aside £320,000 to address people’s concerns about the 2025-26 budget plans, and the committee said the highways department should be allocated some of this to avoid having to make cuts.

Cllr Aled Vaughan Owen, cabinet member for climate change, decarbonisation and sustainability, said the committee would need to come up with alternative proposals if it didn’t think any of the savings measures should go ahead.

Highway asset manager Mr Nelson said around half of the road network in Carmarthenshire comprised historic, undeveloped rural roads, many of which had undeveloped drains.

Referring to the proposed savings, Mr Nelson said: “The last thing we want to be doing is cutting road sweeping and gully emptying because we know how much value that provides. However, efficiencies have to be made, so we have to target resources as best as we can.”