Drivers in pothole-riddled village mock council over barely ‘car-worthy’ road

Irate motorists so fed up of the crumbling roads in their village have erected a road sign warning drivers its potholes will “break your vehicles – and your soul”. Residents in Wrenbury-cum-Frith, near Nantwich, have even changed the village’s welcome sign to rename it ‘Wrenbury-cum-pothole’ after being driven mad by a 200m road with 174 potholes on it.

They say the problems with Station Road, a main thoroughfare leading into the Cheshire village, began around five years ago. And while Cheshire East Council promised to repair it, residents say they’ve been “fobbed off” by the cash-strapped local authority as the issue worsens to the point they say it’s like something from ‘a third world country’.

Lauren Ridgway, a mum in her 40s, said it was “diabolical” that the road in the village, which she has called home 12 years, was barely “car-worthy”. She fumed: “Everybody has just got really humorous about it now because it’s beyond a joke.

“It’s absolutely horrendous. It’s been going on for years. What started off as a couple of potholes here and there is just a massive stretch now. It’s like a third-world country, but I think third-world country roads would actually be better. We’ve got farm tracks that are in better condition than that road.

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“We have to pay road tax, our cars have to be roadworthy, but yet our roads are not car-worthy. It’s diabolical. You used to be able to weave around them. You can’t even do that anymore because the potholes are joined up, and they are quite deep.”

Rob Cooper, 42, who owns local garage RC Autos in the village said the number of motorists needing repairs for damaged tyres had increased dramatically. And although he was seeing a bump in business, he also said regular customers were put off from coming to see him as they were reluctant to drive on the crater-hit road.

Furious locals who live and work in the village of Wrenbury-cum-Frith in Cheshire East have mocked the council and renamed the village sign to Wrenbury-cum-Pothole (Image: William Lailey SWNS)

He said: “I’m doing no end in blowouts and tyres that have been pinched by potholes. It’s just endless. I would normally do three of four tyres every couple of weeks. At the minute, I’m doing three or four tyres a day. It’s massive, it’s crazy, really. I’m actually losing a few customers because they are not coming over that road.

“It’s quite unfair, really, because I’m only a small business, I need that repeat business to come in… Everybody in the village is sick of it.

In 2022, a frustrated local resident installed a ‘swear box’ on the road, writing “In aid of Cheshire East”, which began the trend of poking fun at its poor condition. And last year, a local councillor said the whole village had ‘had enough’ of the road, branding it ‘like the surface of the moon’.

Rob said he appreciated the work of the mystery sign maker who had once again made a funny attempt to bring their plight to attention. He added: “It’s a laugh, it’s just a joke. If you didn’t laugh about it you’d cry. Everybody is so annoyed, and I think it’s quite funny that somebody has made a sign. We keep on getting fobbed off. Now they’re saying it will be done in April, I very much doubt it to be honest. You lose your faith in it.”

Other residents took to social media to vent their fury at the heavily damaged road – with one eagle-eyed local claiming they’d counted 174 potholes in total. They wrote: “174 holes – yes 174 at the last count and impossible to safely drive through it. It is truly criminal what Highways are doing here – five years this has been going on. Every year they ‘run out of budget’ yet consciously put people and property at risk and ruin local businesses.”

A sign has been erected along station road imitating a highway sign which states: ‘This road may break your vehicle and your soul’ (Image: Rob Cooper / SWNS)

Another added: “I travelled into Burma in 2005 and the roads there were better than this one. Went to meet someone at the Dusty Miller pub and honestly thought they’d been testing IEDs on the road.”

A further complained: “It’s been at least 7 years that it has needed repairing but Cheshire East has done nothing but put patch after patch on the road instead of fixing properly. But then again the roads near the Council offices are nice and smooth.”

Councillor Craig Browne, chair of Cheshire East Council’s highways and transport committee, said the council would carry out repairs in April. He said: “Naturally, we are fully aware of the condition of Station Road in Wrenbury and agree that it requires resurfacing. There will be a £600,000 scheme starting in April, which will significantly improve drainage to this location.

“The only alternative to waiting until April would be to resurface now at an additional cost of £65,000 only to have to do this again after the completion of the primary works. With our current budgetary constraints, this is simply not affordable. Additionally, all works need to be agreed in partnership with the Environment Agency and Network Rail.

“We apologise to residents and road users and would like to assure them that we are prioritising this work being carried out as safely and in as timely a way as possible.”

References

^{^} The ‘bargain’ North Staffordshire farmhouse where you can’t even use your own driveway (www.stokesentinel.co.uk)
^{^} Three-bed house goes on market for just £10,000 – but there’s a catch (www.stokesentinel.co.uk)
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