Cambridgeshire County Council has approved £58 million for road maintenance in 2026/27, with key routes including A1307 Hills Road in Cambridge

Cambridgeshire Live readers are sceptical at the news that the County Council has approved nearly £60 million for road maintenance and improvements in 2026/27. The funding will focus on preventative work to extend the life of roads and reduce costly repairs.

Key routes include Hills Road in Cambridge, Cambridge Road in Great Shelford, and Ely Road in Soham. The investment aims to improve safety, resilience, and the overall condition of the county’s highways, according to the council.

Councillor Alex Beckett, chair of the highways and transport committee, said the programme is one of the council’s largest ever investments in local roads. The funding will also be used for maintaining signs and road markings, improving footpaths and cycleways, upgrading drainage, strengthening bridges, and other safety measures.

Most work is scheduled to take place between April 2026 and March 2027.

Commenter Freddly believes: “This needs to go alongside punitive measures to deter SUVs, for example much higher parking charges for SUVs and super-size transit vans, otherwise the pot-holes will soon be back.”

Windypants agrees: “Honestly, SUVs are wrecking our roads with potholes, and their drivers really ought to be paying way more for the damage, we’re talking bigger charges and fines, more often. A simple fix? Set speed cameras 10mph lower just for SUVs. That way, we’d actually get the cash needed to fix all the road damage they cause. Seriously, these vehicles belong off-road, not clogging up our cities, and they pump out more fumes than normal cars, which is why their taxes should constantly go up. The bottom line is we need to make owning an SUV so expensive and annoying that drivers just give up and switch to something sensible, like a bike, the best way to get around, hands down.”

Feelgood66 adds: “We should also be banning all the heavy electric vehicles, some weigh 2.5 tons, I wouldn’t want to be hit by one.”

Q06 complains: “Years of neglect, road injuries, and vehicle damage and this is the amount set aside to fix it all? I’d love to know where all our tax money actually goes.”

Martinjm agrees: “It’s a drop in the ocean. No major road work for nearly fifty years and lorries, buses and dustbin lorries are much bigger and heavier than the roads were designed for. Electric buses must be extremely heavy. If just cars, including SUVs were the only road users it would not be a problem. Commercial traffic is the problem. The problem has gone beyond potholes. I had to buy two new tyres in February and cars go through a lot of wear and tear because of the road surface. It is potentially lethal for cyclists.”

Jam L adds: “They had better be paved with gold for that price. This is where our council tax hikes are going.”

Lucy H says: “I drove along Granhams Road yesterday, the only road fully resurfaced, and remembered what driving used to be like when you could just drive without needing 4WD skills to navigate a combat zone. I’ve already damaged two tyres on potholes this week and they will never fix them all.”

What do you think of Cambridgeshire’s £60 million road plan? Will it make a real difference to safety and travel, or is it just more patching up? Share your thoughts in our comments section.