RESIDENTS were astounded when council workers returned 24 hours after completing road repairs to dig up the same patch of highway.

Allan and Sue Poyner said they have been plagued by 12 months of problems on the road outside their home on Parsonage Road, Blackburn, during the construction of a new housing estate.

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Last Sunday long-awaited repairs were made to potholes and an uneven surface on the road by Blackburn with Darwen Council highways workers.

Later the same day, Mr Poyner said the road area was smoothed and finished by the team.

But just the next day a different team of council workers arrived and began to dig up the same patch of road.

Mr Poyner said he was ‘shocked at the lack of planning and waste’.

Council bosses said that both the repairs were part of a ‘co-ordinated programme to improve road safety’.

Retired sales executive, Mr Poyner, 71, said: “I was flabbergasted to see them back on Monday.

“It was surreal to see them digging up the same area that had been resurfaced a day earlier.

“We hear week after week how cuts are affecting the council with funds being reduced and plans to introduce parking charges at public places like Witton Park.

“And yet it seems teams can be sent out within hours of each other to dig up work that had just been done.

“Surely there must be some joined up thinking. It just seems so wasteful.

“We have suffered so much noise, dust, dirt, traffic and constant disruption for the past year.

“I wonder why are we not entitled to some compensation or council tax rebate.”

Mrs Poyner, 66, a former charity worker who has lived with her husband on Parsonage Road for 25 years, said: “We were shaking our heads at the ludicrous situation.

“We welcomed the initial repairs, they were long overdue but then they seemed to come back and dig at the same area.”

Cllr Colin Rigby, former council leader, said he had sympathy with the residents.

He said: “It is embarrassing to be making this kind of mistake.

“It seems like people are not speaking to each other and I can have some sympathy with the residents.

“We had a similar thing in Edgworth village recently, where we had fading white lines on a bend.

“Contractors turned up to paint one but didn’t do the other one, which was two inches away. I honestly don’t know what’s going on.”

Mr Poyner fears that there may be more work on the road imminently.

He said: “We were advised weeks ago that there are plans to install a large electricity sub station directly opposite our house to provide the additional power needs of the new Persimmon Estate, which would not interrupt our power supply, only to be told this morning that the new sub station will be installed later this month, the road dug up again and our power supply disconnected for 12 hours.”

Brian Bailey, director of planning and prosperity at Blackburn with Darwen Council, said: “The roadwork repairs are part of a coordinated programme to improve road safety.

“The initial work addressed potholes in the road, which the council is legally obliged to repair, and this was followed by the installation of traffic calming measures linked to the new housing scheme.”

No one from Persimmons Homes was available for comment.