Street Force (Sheffield)
The organisation responsible for maintaining the roads and footpaths in Sheffield. The organisation is currently part of Sheffield City Council, and used to be called Sheffield Works Department (SWD), but was reorganised in 2005 in preparation for the bid for a major PFI bid for highways maintenance.
Street Force
The organisation provides design and build functions, parking services, a materials testing lab, management of public toilets, a concrete batching plant, sign workshop and a manufacturing and fabrication workshop.
The organisation manages 1943km of carriageway, 60% of which is covered by winter precautionary salting, 3400km of footway, 556 bridges and structures, 68,700 street lights, 31,000 traffic signs, 471 traffic signal installations, 2,976,000 square metres of verges and planted areas and 72,000 drainage gulleys
Partners
Street Force have ongoing partnerships with CEMEX for road surfacing, Veolia/Police/DVLA for dealing with abandoned cars and YEDL for street lighting electrical service
Highway PFI
In March 2009, Sheffield City Council secured £674.1m in PFI Credits. These credits will be paid to the council with interest as additional grants over the next 25 years, with a further £10m a year bringing a total investment to £2Bn over the whole period of the contract.
The city council is currently in the process of selecting a private sector company to improve and maintain the highway network over the 25 year contract period with a view to select a company by February 2011 and start the contract in August 2011. Most of Street Force will transfer over to the private company, which is likely to be a joint venture type arrangement with a design consultant and construction company.
South Yorkshire Laboratory
Part of the Street Force Organisation is the lab that undertakes testing of construction materials for roads and other building work, including aggregates, asphalt, concrete, air quality, chemical and asbestos.
The lab is a carry over from the South Yorkshire County Council and provides services for the former four local authorities and numerous private sector clients.
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