Professor John Robertson OBA
In a typically perverse piece of BBC Scotland reporting, Andrew Pickens opens with:
Complaining about the amount of roadworks is something of a national pursuit – but it is one that appears to increasingly be justified. The number of recorded roadworks in Scotland is now 28% higher than it was before the Covid pandemic. The end result, a fixed pothole or faster broadband connection, is welcome – but roadworks can mean increased congestion which affects motorists, cyclists and bus users.
before noting:
In 2019/20 the watchdog got 129,713 notices of work starting before hitting a record 166,295 in 2024/2025. This is significantly up on the 104,670 works in 2009/10, the earliest year with comparable figures.
and:
The amount of traffic on Scotland’s roads has been steadily increasing over the last three decades, although there was a drop during the pandemic years. Transport Scotland data shows that in 2019, traffic volumes on the country’s major roads were 46% higher than in 1995. Increased traffic leads to a lot more wear and tear that needs to be fixed.
So, under the SNP, road maintenance is up more than 60% but that’s because traffic is up 46%.
Hmm…why just the 2019 data as the latest?
See this, updated in March 2025:
Traffic is still down on the 2018, pre-pandemic, peak yet councils have been increasing road repairs? That’ll be good news for motorists, no? They hate those potholes don’t they?
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
why don’t they just say SNP bad and leave it at that? Same goes for the Herald and other unionist MSM.
Ian Kirkwood
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Absolutely Ian. I maybe would widen that to the Scottish Government, but of course that would mean not mentioning their principal enemy. What’s more the S.N.P are doing it deliberately to make peoples lives better. How dare they!
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Sorry, the last comment is Alex Beveridge.
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Well spotted John – I did actually read this abject nonsense ” Why are there more roadworks in Scotland than ever? And it’s not down to potholes ” https://archive.ph/YY9k0 piece by Andrew Pickens before the plonker alarm went off over one of those classic ‘Who knew’ moments from undoubtedly the least renowned public broadcast organisation outside Belarus’s ‘Fknell I can’t believe it’s news’ channel.
James Cook has clearly been instructed to fire up ‘ Operation look a squirrel ‘ again, this time not over the Tory conference in Perth, so it has to be something happening in England such as Starmer having declared war on his ingrown toenail…. And there it is buried way down with ” Heatwave over but new hosepipe ban announced “.
FFS, even England’s water wants independence….
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Any and every time we drive south ( mostly to Worcester) there are ALWAYS road works/slow zones/single lanes.
gavinochiltree
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