Additional funding proposed for priority investment areas

Cabinet will consider plans to invest an additional £2.725m in priority areas on top of the Council’s existing 2022/23 capital programme – providing important extra funding for highways, flood alleviation, parks, waste disposal bins and benches, and to upgrade the Darran Park sports pitch to 3G. 

At the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, September 6, Members will consider a report which proposes the additional investment, funded by resources already set aside by the Council for investment in infrastructure. If agreed, the proposals will be considered by Full Council at its meeting on September 28.

The report notes that the investment areas are in line with the Council’s Corporate Plan priorities. Details about the proposed funding are summarised below:

• Highways and Roads (£1million) – continuing to support the enhanced investment in local roads, building upon sustained increases in annual capital funding for highways maintenance over a number of years.
• Unadopted Roads (£100,000) – building upon previously-allocated funding to enable more unadopted roads to be improved and formally adopted by the Council for future maintenance.
• Flood Alleviation works (£1million) – continuing to support work on drainage and flood alleviation schemes, enabling further progress to be made on business cases that will target match funding from Welsh Government.
• Environmental improvements (£50,000) – supporting improvements that include new bins and benches within parks and other open spaces.
• Parks (£200,000) – additional funding to support an ongoing programme of investment to refurbish sports pavilions, to upgrade sports pitches and to further repair parks infrastructure.
• Multi Use Games Areas (£200,000) – developing new MUGAs to include provision for football, basketball and general community use.
• Darran Park sports pitch (£175,000) – additional resources made available, alongside an external funding application, to upgrade the existing facility in Ferndale from an astro-turf pitch to a 3G surface. The project cost amounts to £375,000 in total.

Councillor Andrew Morgan OBE, Leader of Rhondda Cynon Taf Council and Cabinet Member for Infrastructure and Investment, said: “The report that Cabinet will consider on Tuesday proposes an additional £2.725m funding for key Council priority areas, over and above the respective multi-million pound Capital Programmes for 2022/23 that were agreed earlier this year.

“This additional ‘one-off’ resource is available from Council reserves that have already been earmarked for investment in improvements to our infrastructure. Since October 2015, around £144m of additional resources have been allocated by the Council in this way, to provide further investment to support key priorities.

“The proposed £1m allocation for Highways and Roads will provide additional funding on top of the £4.6m maintenance programme in 2022/23, under which a number of road repairs and renewals have already taken place this summer. The extra £100,000 for Unadopted Roads will support delivery of the initial seven pilot schemes announced in 2021/22, and the 13 new schemes included in the 2022/23 Capital Programme – for which £500,000 was allocated in March.

“I also welcome the additional £1m proposed for further flood alleviation work alongside further funding opportunities via Welsh Government. In total, around £12m has been spent on infrastructure upgrades in this area in recent years, as well as £15m on repairs since Storm Dennis.

“The proposed funding also aims to improve the environment around us, and ensure residents and visitors can enjoy the outdoor spaces that Rhondda Cynon Taf offers. This includes repairs and upgrades to pavilions, sports pitches and infrastructure in our parks, developing Multi Use Games Areas for leisure activities, and providing more waste bins and benches at key locations.

“The funding proposed for a new 3G sports pitch in Ferndale, by upgrading the existing Darran Park astro-turf, would complement a funding application for this future project. It would become the fifteenth ‘all-weather’ 3G sports pitch across Rhondda Cynon Taf, that has either been announced or built to date. The Council continues to deliver upon its commitment to provide one of these facilities within three miles of every home in the County Borough.”