Inverness councillors yesterday agreed to work together to push for city roads to be allocated maintenance funding based on usage, rather than length.
They expressed concerns with the way road maintenance budgets are allocated, with attempts to distribute the money fairly among wards.
They said under the current formula, arterial routes through and around Inverness would never get essential work done.
Road operations manager for Inverness, John Taylor said his team had ‘a good handle’ on which roads are bad, and spent a huge amount of time preparing the budget to balance it fairly between the seven local wards.
Depute leader councillor Alasdair Christie said a fundamental change was needed in the formula to ensure that Inverness got its fair share of the extra £1.5m funding the council has allocated to roads maintenance for the coming year.
He said: “Inverness has never had its fair share because one factor is missing repeatedly, that is the usage of the road, not its length.
“We should look at this collectively, not at separate ward meetings, to make sure the arterial roads are treated on a fair basis.”
Councillors approved his call for an urgent seminar to allow them to agree the local roads maintenance programme.