The Highland Council is to write to every householder in the Highlands to raise awareness of the campaign it has launched to win more funds for roads.

An information leaflet is being enclosed in Council Tax bill leaflets, which will be arriving on 100,000 doorsteps from the week beginning Monday 25 February.

It highlights the need to reverse a trend of deterioration on the local road network and invites householders to give their views on what can be done to attract more resources and what the council can do to improve the roads service it delivers.

The Council is anxious to find resources to tackle crumbling roads and bridges and upgrade the remaining main single track roads. It also wants to divert as much freight on to rail and sea and review winter maintenance arrangements to ensure safe travel.

It believes that the deterioration of the road network coincides with the decline in road maintenance budgets over recent years. Such is the extent of the problem that it is estimated that £82 million is needed to bring Highlands roads up to a reasonable standard. A further £55 million is required to strengthen bridges, many of which require weight restrictions.

It is reckoned that the Council needs to spend an extra £10 million per year to allow the average period between road surfacing to be reduced from today’s 200 years to a more realistic, bur not ideal, rate of 40 years.

Councillor Green said: "We are mounting this campaign because of our grave concerns about the deteriorating state of many of our roads. I know these concerns are shared in many of our communities, where there is frustration at the lack of funding to repair the crumbling infrastructure. A sound road network is especially important in the Highlands, where a single access can be a lifeline to the outside world.

"We will closely review our own funding and operational arrangements and urge the Scottish Executive to recognise the problem and allocate significantly more funds for our roads. We will be enlisting the support of householders, community groups, businesses and local and national politicians to argue for additional funding."

Councillor Green said many Highland roads had not been built to bear the weight of 44-tonne trucks hauling timber fish and building materials and were creaking under the strain. The Council’s Transport Strategy encouraged greater use of public transport and businesses to transport freight by rail or sea. The reality, however, was that for the foreseeable future, the Highlands would rely on the road network.

He said the situation had not been helped by the separation of the responsibility for maintaining local roads and trunk roads. The Council continued to maintain the local roads (4,118 miles) while BEAR Scotland were employed by the Scottish Executive to maintain the trunk road network (616 miles). This had resulted in a loss of economies of scale, duplication of effort and a reduction in spending by the Executive on road maintenance.