Communication, when it matters.

Now that the snow and ice has mostly cleared (I've just got one lonely and miserable looking patch on the lawn), there are two noticeable things it has left us with.

The first is potholes, and the second is rubbish.

As you're no doubt aware, freezing temperatures cause havoc with the roads. This is especially true when the roads are wet (like with snow) because moisture gets into cracks, freezes and expands, pushing the surface apart.

These are popping up all over Macclesfield, like an outbreak on an adolescent's face, and the council want and need to fix them. But they need your help in locating them. Without knowing where they are, they can't be fixed. Obviously.

So if you come across one, please log it on the joint highways site here:
http://maps.cheshire.gov.uk/cheshirecc.interactivemapping.web.internet/Default.aspx#aTabTop3

This portal is very easy to use, and can be used for logging other defects such as broken street lights.

With regards to rubbish, hopefully everyone's bins are being collected as normal now, and the backlog has been dealt with. By all accounts the waste collection teams did an excellent job at clearing up the mess - especially as wheelie bins were overflowing.

On the whole I don't think there are many people that will complain too much about the backlog stacking up. It was clear that the weather was extreme and this gave the refuse collection teams serious problem. (I'm sure this post will bring some of them out of the woodwork screaming "It's not good enough....I pay my council tax...etc"). But come on, lets be reasonable.

But what wasn't good enough was that the communication from the Council. People didn't know when their bins were to be collected. They didn't know what recycling would be taken. So most people left everything on the kerb for two weeks in the hope that they'd come home from work and it would all be gone.

In fact, some of my friends and neighbours had rung the council, but they were given no more information than we already knew. Which was nothing.

Radio Presenter Heidi Reid hammered this point home as we discussed the weather outside the Council HQ in Sandbach. She suggested that the council should have had a constantly updating section of the website during the crisis period detailing which streets would be collected on what day. I think this is an excellent idea, and technically very easy.

Luckily, just as we were getting to the meaty bit John Nicholson happened to walk past - who is the head of service dealing with roads and rubbish. Undoubtedly he can't have been too excited about the prospect of a Councillor and Radio presenter tag team just before he made it back to the office with a nice sandwich, but he was very helpful and said that communications would be improved in the future.

I have often been critical of the Cheshire East communications department in the past. Mostly because I think they send out too many press releases about things that don't matter, and because of the communication protocol which went a little bit too far. Over the period of bad weather they did some excellent work, with regular updates as to what the gritters were doing and how passable the roads were.

But something needs to be done to ensure a better link between them and the people in the waste department that know which roads are being collected when. Perhaps this means splitting the communications department apart and embedding staff in the relevant departments. That would be quite a nice way to destroy the PR empire as well...