More than 100 people packed into a Cults church to voice their frustration about the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route at a public meeting with the Scottish Government’s Transport Minister Humza Yousaf MSP last night.
Mr Yousaf made the trip to the north-east from Glasgow after several requests from north-east MSPs who had raised concerns over the impact of the works.
Residents from areas such as Stonehaven, Kingswells, Milltimber and other communities close to the construction of the £745million bypass raised a number of concerns with Mr Yousaf, who was accompanied by officials from Transport Scotland at the Cults Parish Church meeting.
Mr Yousaf heard about farmers concerned over run-off from AWPR worksites flowing onto their land during periods of heavy rainfall; fears of contamination affecting the River Dee; damage caused to local roads by heavy Transport Scotland construction vehicles; and a range of other problems.
Worried locals were given assurances by Mr Yousaf that the issues would be dealt with, but due to the number of individual complaints, he could not offer a timetable as to when they would be addressed.
The Transport Minister said: “It depends on the complexity.
“When I asked about issues surrounding drainage, I saw about 20 hands go up, so we’ll have to appreciate that each individual case will have to be examined, and if there are things we can do for them, then, of course, we will do that.
“People here are understandably emotive. It’s difficult to do an infrastructure project the size of the AWPR and not be affecting people.
“What we’ve heard here is a lot of people who feel they haven’t been appropriately dealt with and haven’t been appropriately compensated, so I have given an assurance that we’ll look at these examples and see what we can do that is appropriate.”
Speaking after the meeting, north-east MSP, Ross Thomson, who helped to organise and chair the event, said: “I would like to offer my sincere thanks to the Minister for taking the time to come up to Aberdeen and hear for himself some of the issues that have been raised.
“There have been a range of issues that local people felt were not being properly addressed, so I hope that tonight’s meeting will have helped in that regard.”