Sheffield City Council in the UK is set to sign a £1.21bn contract to carry out maintenance works on the city’s roads, with the winning bidder planned to be selected by early 2012.

Under the plan, the council will transfer road maintenance work to a private company in April 2012.

Amey and CarillionMouchel are the two companies bidding for the one of the largest Private Finance Initiative’s (PFI) in the UK.

The winning firm will be responsible for maintaining 2,000km of road, 65,000 streetlights, 480 traffic signals, and 350 bridges, according to the BBC.