Wigan's roads will soon be clear of weeds as workers tackle backlog

Members of Wigan Council’s street scene team were diverted from their normal jobs to support critical services during the pandemic, which created a backlog of street maintenance work and saw weeds grow for longer than usual.

However, it is now business as usual and they are working to tackle weeds along main routes in the borough, focusing first on traffic islands.

Coun Paul Prescott, cabinet portfolio member for environment, said: “With our street scene team supporting other vital council services like bin collections during the pandemic, there are more weeds than we would normally expect to see.

"During this ‘Weeds Wipe Out’ our street scene team are tackling this excess, hand-pulling weeds that remain and sweeping up the soil and dirt that accumulates along kerbs that acts as a seed bed for next year’s weeds. So we are tackling the existing problem and getting ahead of the problem for next year.”