17th
December 2004
New Year Start for New West Station Bridge
MSP for Greenock and Inverclyde, Duncan
McNeil, has welcomed the news that work on replacing the West Station Bridge is
set to begin in February.
The
project has been beset by delays – most recently as a result of financial
giants, Legal and General, refusing to sell a piece of land required to build a
new bridge to current standards. Following
the conclusion of the legal process, the land been compulsorily purchased and
the contract to build the new bridge has now been awarded.
Mr
McNeil says the replacement of the 19th Century bridge, closed in
2000 for safety reasons, is welcome, if long overdue.
“This
saga has gone on far too long,” he told the Telegraph.
“It has been a source of intense
frustration to me, local businesses and motorists that, while money was in place
to build a new bridge, a lack of urgency and the intransigence of landowners led
to delay after delay.
“But,
credit where credit’s due, the Minister listened to our frustrations, took the
landowners on, forced a compulsory purchase through the legal process and has
got a result.
“I
am still angry that we’ve had to endure a one-way system more at home in a
Heath Robinson cartoon than Greenock. But,
thankfully, it seems the years of inconvenience are could finally be coming to
an end.”
Tenders
for the work were issued in September. These
were returned recently and, following a review, C Spencer Ltd. has been awarded
the contract. As work will be done
above a railway line, close liaison with Network Rail will be required.
Despite this, work is scheduled start on site in February 2005.
The construction work itself is planned to take 15 months.
ENDS
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