Sheffield City Council fills in severe potholes '˜within an hour' on averageÂ

Analysis by motoring research charity the RAC Foundation showed Sheffield City Council was one of a cluster of authorities that tackle road defects within 60 minutes. 

This is faster than a lot of other councils as the data revealed the most common response time is two hours, with 79 local authorities looking to patch up their roads within this period.

In other parts of the country, Cumbria, Flinstshire and South Lanarkshire councils try to act "immediately" to repair road defects within minutes. 

Meanwhile, Coventry City Council has the longest target time for severe pothole repairs, aiming to respond within five days.

The RAC Foundation said response times are influenced by how many miles of road a council has to manage and the size of the council area.

Director Steve Gooding said: "It is understandable that large rural authorities set themselves longer response times, simply as a result of having to travel further to effect repairs, but motorists might still be surprised to see such a wide variation across the country.

"Those particularly vulnerable to potholes - cyclists and motorcyclists - might ask whether the speed of pothole investigation should be based solely on the risk to users."

The data comes after Sheffield City Council bosses said the number of reported potholes in the city has more than halved.

A Freedom of Information request showed a total of 2,468 complaints were made in Sheffield in 2017 '“ a 57 per cent drop on the 5,799 reports made in 2015.