ROADWORKS that crippled the A217, causing months of delays, are to return – after the road was not resurfaced properly.

Defects in the tarmac will cause our main arterial road to grind to a halt once again when emergency repairs are carried out in August.

The work has been timed to avoid the Olympics, but officials cannot yet confirm exactly when it will start or how long it will take – although it is known that both carriageways will be affected, possibly for up to a month.

Frustrated drivers were subjected to seven months of delays from July last year, when Sutton and East Surrey Water dug up a two-mile stretch of the road to lay a new water pipeline. The contractors left only in February, after the works overran by more than two months.

Michael Gosling, the county councillor for Banstead South, said: "I think that this is disgraceful.
"I find it wrong that they should even have dreamt of packing up their kit and going home.
"You expect them to put the road back in a satisfactory condition – and they didn't do that."

The water company has agreed to remove and reinstate the surface of a section of the A217 on both carriageways between the Tadworth and Chipstead roundabouts after Surrey County Council said the job they did first time round was not up to scratch.

Cllr Gosling said he had been contacted on a daily basis by residents unhappy with the state of the road.
Water board spokesman Stuart Hyslop said: "There are a couple of stretches in the carriageway where the reinstatement is a few millimetres below what it used to be. It is a technical fault with the material."

The water company has agreed to rectify the substandard work "as a gesture of goodwill", he said, adding: "My understanding is that the contractors will do the job in exactly the same way they did it previously, which will mean they will have to close one lane.

"That is why we are trying to get the work done in August."

Commuters and businesses fear the works will once again cause gridlock on one of the busiest stretches of the dual carriageway.

Danny Kimber, 31, managing director of First Class Plumbing and Bathroom Supplies in The Parade, Burgh Heath, said: "We rely on passing trade. What's planned is up the road but it does worry me. And it's the summer, so it's the peak time for me as well.

"It will affect business – and some businesses more than others. The chip shop here was badly affected last time.
"This is the main road for the M25.
"They should have got it right the first time."
Article from Surrey Today