The leader of Aberdeen City Council has conceded defeat in a fight to speed up improvement work at a notorious traffic bottleneck.
Barney Crockett said the local authority would “reluctantly” accept the Scottish Government’s decision to upgrade the Haudagain roundabout after the Aberdeen bypass is due to open in 2018. The Labour councillor discussed the issue with Transport Minister Keith Brown at Holyrood yesterday.
City councillors backed a motion in August to work towards completing the work within two years.
The impasse between the council and the government has caused unease among people in the Middlefield area and one man, Russell Mcgonigle, of Manor Drive, claimed he was living in a state of “limbo”.
The news was welcomed last night by Aberdeen Donside SNP MSP Mark McDonald, who said the council’s “nonsensical” position had caused “uncertainty and anxiety” for people who face having their homes demolished to make way for the project. “If the Labour-led administration had applied commonsense at the outset, this could have been avoided,” he added.
The roundabout works and wider regeneration of Middlefield will affect 325 households. The government is expected to compensate the council and owner-occupiers for the demolition of 140 homes.
Mr Crockett, who said the council would be responsible for rehousing people, said the talks were “positive and worthwhile”.
“I was given a strong verbal commitment to the scheme and it will be done after the AWPR (Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route), although we would want it to be done earlier. We are giving him every encouragement we can but we have to reluctantly accept the government is making decisions about the timetable.
“We may not be happy with that but we have done everything we possibly can and we will try to keep pressing on that.”
Mr Crockett said it was of particular importance to the council that the government provided a written guarantee that it is committed to the project.
He added that the minister gave him “as strong a commitment as he could in words, but it is not cast in stone”.
Mr Crockett said he also sought assurances that the government would cover the cost of moving community facilities like the Healthy Hoose to another location in the city.
The Aberdeen bypass is predicted to reduce traffic congestion at the roundabout by about 20%.
Mr Brown said: “I had a productive meeting with Barney Crockett today when the key stages in the programme were outlined.
“Transport Scotland will continue to work closely with council officials who are responsible for the regeneration proposals in the Middlefield area to help identify a joint programme to best take forward both projects in tandem.”