RARELY does a week go by when I do not receive at least one phone call from someone complaining about the state of Herefordshire's roads.

And I have written many stories about them.

I started covering the state of the county's roads early last year and, the way things are going, I can see myself telling readers about many more incidents.

In my opinion, some of the roads are a disgrace and urgent action needs to be taken before someone gets seriously hurt or worse.

We experienced freezing temperatures early last year, which caused widespread problems, and this year has been all about the floods.

I appreciate that Herefordshire Council can only do so much and is playing catch-up due to a lack of investment that it has had in previous years.

But, try telling that to someone who has to fork out hundreds of pounds for new tyres and alloy wheels because they have hit a pothole....again!

I went out with Balfour Beatty last month to see some potholes being repaired and had a long conversation with a manager about the amount of work they have to do.

Sometimes, people forget the amount of roads that are in the county and, of course, there has to be a system in place to ensure the ones on the main A-roads get repaired first.

But, how are people meant to get on the main roads when a damaged road prevents them from getting there?

The ironic thing is that I sustained a flat tyre after hitting a pothole not long after I went out with the team.

Frustration kicks in when you've hit one and you start asking yourself "why didn't I see it?" or "what could I have done to avoid it?"

But, sometimes you can't see or avoid them.

And if you do see one, what are you meant to do if there is oncoming traffic?

Swerve into them?

Of course not.

The frustrating thing is that you don't seem to see as many potholes in other counties.

As many people have been saying, "you know when you're driving in Herefordshire."

Whether that’s due to other counties investing more in its roads, I don’t know.

I’m also not a road maintenance expert, so I’m not obliged to say whether I think the right materials and procedures are being used correctly.

But, it is annoying when potholes reappear shortly after being repaired, even when you take the weather into consideration.

A £20m investment programme has been proposed by the council for long-term road maintenance, but this won’t sort out the potholes.

It has been estimated that the recent bad weather caused around £2.8m worth of damage to the county's roads.

Last year's problems did not seem to have been fully fixed.

Will these, especially if we have more heavy rain in the coming months?

Who knows?

What I do know is that there are a lot of frustrated motorists who would just want to experience a pleasant journey across the county.