SHROPSHIRE Council has received a financial boost in its effort to improve the county’s traffic lights, and to save money and carbon.

The council has been awarded £250,000 through the government’s Traffic Signals Maintenance Specific Grant, which will speed up its traffic signals refurbishment programme over the next two years.

Steve Charmley, Shropshire Council’s Cabinet member with responsibility for highways, said the funding comes as an excellent bit of news for the county.

He said: “It will help to ensure that we have better, more reliable traffic lights, but also help to save the council money, and reduce the carbon emissions that result from traffic light usage and maintenance.

“It also means that we will achieve our carbon reduction and improved air quality targets more quickly.

“So, it’s good news for the council, for all road users, and for the environment.”

The money will be spent in three ways ¬– firstly converting 11 traffic light junction from low (LV) to extra low voltage (ELV) and upgrading them to Microprocessor Optimised Vehicle Actuation (MOVA) – saving money and carbon; then a programme of refurbishing controlled crossings from LV to ELV will be partially completed significantly reduce energy/carbon consumption by around 65 per cent; and finally remote monitoring units will be added to crossing sites which are not currently remotely monitored and are not included in the LV to ELV sites listed above.

Assuming a 30-year life span for each set of lights, this work will save the council an estimated £118,500.