MP intervenes as row over estate's road rumbles on

ADOPTION ISSUE IS RAISED IN PARLIAMENT

- By OLIVER PRIDMORE

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE County Council is still refusing to maintain the roads of a housing estate, 10 years after it was built.

The authority remains locked in a row with housebuilder Persimmon over the Owston Road estate, in Annesley - and the area's MP claims it could cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to rectify the issue.

Another meeting is scheduled next week between the two parties, but the council still insists the material used on the roads fails to meet its standards.

Roads on the estate were built using permeable block paving and Persimmon says this material was approved by the local planning authority, Ashfield District Council.

But the county council, which has responsibility for highways, says the material was used "without the required legal agreements".

A highways authority usually formally 'adopts' a road, taking responsibility for its future maintenance, after a developer has built a housing estate.

Persimmon says it continues to struggle to reach a "realistic fee" for which the county council would adopt the Owston Road estate after 10 years.