Around 14 per cent of Reading’s bridges are ‘substandard’, research by the Royal Automobile Club Foundation for Motoring (RAC Foundation) has revealed.

Reading Borough Council (RBC) manages 96 bridges, 13 of which are considered substandard: defined as unable to carry the heaviest vehicles.

This puts the council in sixteenth place for local authorities in England with the highest percentage of bridges in need of repair.

An RBC spokesman said: "The RAC report makes clear that the term ‘substandard’ in this instance refers to bridges that are unable to carry the heaviest loads, rather than them being in any danger of collapse.

"As with all local authorities, the council relies on Government funding for these works to take place."

The council intends to bring four bridges back to ‘full load capacity’ in the next five years and said it would bring 12 bridges back into use if there were not resource restrictions.

RBC was awarded £643,000 in funding for highways maintenance work in November 2018.

The report states bringing all 13 bridges back to a ‘good’ standard would cost an estimated £50m.

The council have, however, clarified that this is the total investment required for improvement works to the whole stock of highway structures in Reading.

Substandard bridges are often subject to weight restrictions, while others are under programmes of increased monitoring or managed decline.

Wokingham Borough Council has five substandard bridges, while West Berkshire Council has just two.

The RAC Foundation is a registered charity. It is a transport policy and research organisation that explores the economic, mobility, safety and environmental issues relating to roads and their users.

Additional research from the charity found that RBC can take up to three hours to respond to repair requests for the most severe road defects or pot holes.

Neighbouring authority Bracknell Forest Council's response time is up to one hour, with Wokingham and West Berks taking up to two hours - the most common maximum response time.

Some councils can take as long as three or more days to intervene, with response times influenced by how many miles of road a council has to manage and the geographical size of the council area.

The Council is in the process of reviewing its response times for all highways related work.