Upper Eastern Green Lane has been voted worst for potholes...

[dutchman]

The western Coventry street causes issued for drivers and residents alike



Upper Eastern Green Lane has been voted the worst for potholes by Coventry residents - and it’s not hard to see why. Even in the Eastern Green area, the street seems by far and away the worst-paved road.

It’s baffling when you consider that nearby Broad Lane is far busier and yet is in much better condition. All things considered, Coventry does quite well with the condition of its streets.

The worst example I’ve witnessed was in Halifax, West Yorkshire, where some streets were so abysmal I was scared my car would bottom out. However, Upper Eastern Green Lane was exceptionally poor.

On my visit, I saw a pockmarked mess of fill-ins and bodge jobs in desperate need of a full schedule of work. Residents agree, with one saying a dip in the road near a manhole cover means he heard a thud from every vehicle going past his house.

When asked why he thought the road was so bad, the resident, who declined to be named, said: “I think it’s a few things.

“There’s a lot of heavy vehicles and agricultural vehicles coming down here which increases the wear on the road. And that’s going to get worse with the new developments nearby. It’s not just the road that needs fixing, it’s the pavements as well.”

One of the issues pointed out is that while the road is treated as a local access road, in reality it is used by drivers as a thoroughfare to bypass Broad Lane. That results in cars doing excessive speed on a very straight piece of road.

As I was speaking to locals, I spotted at least three BMWs doing well in excess of the speed limit - quite an achievement given how rutted the road was. Another resident, Aimee Redhead, said she wanted to see sections of the road closed for it to be fixed properly.

She said: “Instead of just every now and then turning up and patching it up, if they were to shut it off in sections and properly sort it out. Obviously it would be an inconvenience but people would understand because it would sort the problem out.

“The amount of heavy duty lorries coming down here is just making the problem worse. Particularly down at the end, it’s like the surface of the moon.”

[dutchman]

Coventry's potholed roads 'like driving on moon'



A Coventry driver has said the city's roads are like "driving on the surface of the moon".

Andy Beaufoy from Eastern Green said he suffered damage to his car totalling £120 after hitting a pothole on Coventry Ring Road.

"I was only doing 30mph but I hit it with an almighty thud," he said. "I had to do an emergency spare tyre change in the garage that was just down the road."

His comments came after it emerged the number of potholes in Coventry had increased by 550% during the winter months, according to the city council.

It has emerged there are about 650 potholes in the city as a result of the winter's wet weather.

The figures are much higher than those claimed ahead of the city's annual road repair budget, which was signed off last month.

Richard Brown, Coventry City Council's cabinet member for finance, had told the BBC there were just 100 potholes in the city ahead of pushing through a one-off £2m investment to improve roads and footpaths as well as street cleaning.

But speaking to Breakfast on BBC CWR, Mark O'Connell, strategic lead for Highway Operations at the authority, said those figures were for November 2025. He acknowledged the number had grown and repairs were now taking longer.

He said on Monday: "Pothole inquiries we've had in January and February this year is higher than we had in all of 2025.

"And our numbers from the end of last year to where we are now have dramatically increased.

"What's happened is over the winter the sheer amount of rainfall and wetness we had gets into the road service, starts to break it out and it's not just in Coventry it's an issue, it's across the country."

He also encouraged people to report potholes to the council.