road verges on rural roads - NERC Open Research Archive ...

CHAPTER I. EXTENT AND FUNCTION OF ROADSIDE VERGES
INTRODUCTION
This report is based on information given to the author during visits to
County Surveyors or their delegated officers at various times during the first
half of 1972. The interviews took the form of a set of standard questions and
were recorded on a proforma to give comparable data. All the mainland counties
of England and Wales, the Isle of Wight and Anglesey were visited with the
exception of Middlesex, making a total of 58 (45 English and 13 Welsh) County
Authorities.
The object of the survey was to obtain first hand information on various
aspects of the policies and attitudes of Highway Departments to the management
of <strong>road</strong>side <strong>verges</strong> and other factors relating to them. The need for this
information had become increasingly urgent as part of the Nature Conservancy's
research programme into the conservation importance and management of <strong>road</strong>sides,
as well as for giving advice and answering the questions of a wide range of
organisations and individuals on these topics.
A previous postal survey in 1964, besides being out-of-date, had not proved
very successful through lack of comparability in the replies, although some of
the replies did provide some very detailed and useful information. A similar
postal survey in 1970/71 by Dr. E.M. Buckle (1971) on behalf of the Settle and
District Civic Society, whilst again providing some interesting data, was
necessarily limited in its scope.
To some extent the information reported is subjective in that the answers to
some of the questions, such as the reasons for mowing <strong>road</strong> <strong>verges</strong>, represent the
personal opinion of the officer interviewed. However, as this officer was usually
either the person responsible for formulating policy, or for implementing it, the
report should present a cross-section of the thinking behind policies and
principles of <strong>road</strong>side management in 1972. During the course of the interviews
it was interesting to note that disagreements often arose between officers when
more than one representative of a Highway Department was present. This suggested
that apart from one or two generally agreed points, such as the need to maintain
sightlines at bends and junctions, most other matters to do with <strong>road</strong>sides were
matters of opinion between one individual and another, or a committee or a pressure
group and that these might change with changes in the personalities involved.
This report concerns rural <strong>road</strong>s, the majority of which are the responsibility
of County Councils or County Councils as agent authorities for the Department of
the Environment (DOE). So far as the Trunk<strong>road</strong>s includine. Motorways under the control
of DOE are concerned, management is governed by technical memoranda and directives
that are issued from time to time. Nevertheless, in the treatment of <strong>road</strong>sides
these directives are open to a wide range of interpretation by County Councils