By Richard Fairhurst

THERE’S one subject guaranteed to unite cyclists and motorists, and that’s potholes. Potholes break car and bike wheels alike.

We don’t have to worry about holing exhausts or bending suspension, but that’s small comfort when hitting a pothole could fracture a cyclist’s spine and shatter their skull, as recently happened to one Buckinghamshire rider. Yes, we all hate potholes. Fill them in!

Except… it’s not that easy, is it? Cyclists don’t always agree with Oxfordshire County Council’s priorities, but in this case, the council is truly between an (eroded) rock and a hard place. Central Government gives them less money every year and tells them to do more: care for the elderly, support troubled kids, keep schools running. We could debate how to fix potholes most efficiently all day (“Dragon patcher”? Man with a barrow? To seal or not to seal?), but however you do it, OCC can never afford to level every road in the county. Much though I don’t enjoy slaloming around the holes in the lanes, schools are more important.

Potholes don’t appear fully formed overnight. They need two things: wet weather and heavy traffic. As the ground underneath the road expands and contracts, the Tarmac weakens, to be broken up by traffic running over it.

We can’t do anything about the bad weather, more’s the pity. But we can do something about the traffic.

The Local Government Association reckons that bigger lorries, five per cent heavier in just one year, are making potholes worse. Conversely, you see fewer potholes on a pavement or Tarmaced bike track, because 1st 8lb of bike causes less wear than 1.3 tonnes of car. The less traffic, the fewer potholes will form.

We’re not going to cut traffic on the A34 any time soon (though, come on guys, build the railway to Cambridge already). But we can remove most through traffic from minor roads. Should trucks be rumbling along rural Oxfordshire lanes just to save a few seconds? Should rat-running commuters cut through narrow residential streets because they set off too late to catch the train? By keeping through traffic to the through roads, we reduce the wear and tear on the minor streets, and can concentrate maintenance where it’s needed most.

In the satnav age, putting up signs saying “Please don’t drive down here” won’t work. 20mph limits help. But you need physical measures to stop through traffic. Highway engineers call this “filtered permeability”: install bollards across one end of a residential street, and the traffic disappears.

The bonus is that the street instantly becomes more liveable. With fewer speeding rat-runners, your kids can play safely. Cyclists can weave past the bollards to the shops. Pedestrians can cross easily. A better place to live, and safer roads for cyclists. That’s why cities from London to Chicago are adopting this approach. Why not Oxfordshire?

And actually: closing rat-runs won’t slow you down. In my day job I build software to optimise deliveries for courier companies. It’s smart. It clusters nearby deliveries together. A few bollards will mean hardly any more courier miles. Meanwhile, OCC can get on with fixing the potholes on the main roads.