An Argyll firm has been awarded the contract for a shoreside promenade that will be the “final piece in the jigsaw” for a Highland harbour.
Mallaig Harbour Authority has appointed Tsl Contractors Limited, of Oban, to carry out the work on the Lochaber village’s East Bay Beach.
The walkway will link the £1million Mallaig yachting marina, which opened in East Bay in September 2011, with new toilets, showers and laundry facilities at the west coast fishing port.
The promenade contract involves demolishing part of the existing retaining wall and slipway. This will be rebuilt to include access steps and the remaining concrete-faced retaining wall will be refaced with stone.
The footway will be widened to tie in with the existing road surface and new decorative fencing, planters and seating will be installed, along with decorative floodlighting to illuminate a rock face next to the promenade.
Meanwhile, Fion Construction, of Fort William, recently started work on a new slipway on Mallaig’s Lovat Beach.
Work on the slipway involves building reinforced concrete retaining walls, backfilling with rock and constructing a reinforced concrete slipway slab.
Port manager Robert MacMillan said it was hoped that both projects would be completed by the end of January.
He said: “The slipway and the promenade are the final missing pieces of the jigsaw for the marina.”
Finance for both projects has been provided by the harbour authority, Nevis Estates and the Highland European Fisheries Fund Axis 4 Programme.
Earlier this year, multi-millionaire theatre producer Sir Cameron Mackintosh was granted permission for a separate harbour-side project costing £750,000. The scheme includes demolition of the former village hall on his Nevis Estate.