URGENT drainage work will start next week on a flood-prone West Somerset road connecting villages on the edge of the Brendon Hills.

Halse Road, in Ash Priors, regularly suffers surface water flooding which runs off from a nearby common.

The water freezes in cold weather and in the past winter has caused a significant problem for road users and residents with excessive rainfall followed by freezing temperatures.

Next week’s work will help ensure the road is safe all year round.

However, the new Somerset Council said its highways team would need to fully close a 273-yard section of the road for about a month, from Monday, April 3, to Friday, May 5.

A spokesman said the team would ‘do its utmost to minimise the impact on local residents’ and access to properties in the immediate area would be maintained throughout the work.

The council’s transport portfolio holder, Cllr Mike Rigby, said: “We are really pleased to be delivering these essential works which will make the road much safer.

“The current situation means the road can be very dangerous in wet and freezing conditions.

“This is not part of our precautionary gritting route, it is not possible for us to grit every road, and we had numerous requests for action from residents.

“Of course, this is going to cause some short-term inconvenience, but there is massive long-term gain for road users and residents.”