Dundee LibDem councillor praises work on improved street lighting service

Dundee City Council's LibDem Planning & Transport Convener today (Friday 8th June) praised the work of a Dundee-based street-lighting partnership in continuing to drive down repair costs.

The city council's planning and transport committee will be told on Monday (June 11) that the average repair cost was now £25.53 compared with £37.79 in 2002/03. And there had also been a dramatic reduction in the number of street lighting faults, with the numbers almost halved over the same period.

Planning and Transport Convener Councillor Fraser Macpherson said, "The partnership between the City Council and Tayside Contracts was intended to provide a more cost-efficient service and that is certainly continuing to be achieved.

"In fact, Dundee is one of the top performing local authorities in the country for the prompt, efficient way that repairs are dealt with and for maintaining the city's 22,000 lighting columns.

"Street lighting makes a very important contribution to road safety and to crime prevention and it is encouraging to see the partnership go from strength to strength."

The report to committee also focuses on continuing prompt response times for repairs, with almost 97% carried out within seven days and 91.68% within two working days.

The partnership provides a single operational structure for lighting, with all operations carried out by a combined staff working together out of the same offices. The partnership was extended to include Perth and Kinross Council last year.