Leaders have argued a £49m bypass which has faced delays and soaring costs is "money well spent". Colliery Way, formerly referred to as the Gedling Access Road, opened for the first time to members of the public this week.
It has taken more than two years for the Gedling Access Road to be built after sitting in the pipeline for roughly five decades. Workers have laid 45,000 tonnes of tarmac and shifted huge amounts of dirt to construct a colossal embankment to hold up the 3.8km route which spans from Mapperley Plains to the A612 Colwick Loop Road.
While the road, officially named Colliery Way, will completely open to traffic from midday on March 22, cyclists and pedestrians were given the chance to trace the route during the afternoon on Monday, March 21. Year seven pupils from the nearby Carlton Le Willows Academy also helped plant a sapling from the Major Oak in Sherwood Forest to mark the occasion, as part of a scheme to help support the environment with 53,000 new trees planted along the route.
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Councillor Neil Clarke, chairman of the transport and highways committee at Nottinghamshire County Council, told Nottinghamshire Live: "This is a great benefit for the people of Nottinghamshire, especially obviously the local people. It has been 50 years in the making and it has now come to fruition.
"It will reduce congestion, reduce journey times and help alleviate traffic congestion towards the village of Gedling. Coupled with that are the environmental benefits, 53,000 trees have been planted during the project.
"All in all it is a great benefit and it will help benefit the economy because of that extra access to businesses and there is also new housing projects."
The project has not been without issue however. It has been in the pipeline for five decades and during its eventual construction costs soared to almost £9m over budget.
An additional £8.6m, attributed to issues stemming from the coronavirus pandemic, logistics, adverse weather and material prices, was needed to complete the project. Commenting on the additional costs Tom Randall, Gedling's Conservative MP, said: "I think those extra costs were Covid-related ultimately.
"At that point, once you are a long way into a programme, I think it is either do you stop, which is going to waste money and incur costs later on, or do you carry on and get the project done? I think that is probably the right decision because actually we have not got the re-starting up costs which would have been incurred if everything had been mothballed, and we have actually got the thing that we have invested so much time and money in at the end. Once it is open people will see it is money well spent."
The project, it is said, will also bring in more ecological and environmental benefits. Seven badger tunnels, seven bat hop-overs, a bat house and six amphibian tunnels, as well as improved pedestrian and cycle links to Gedling Country Park, have been built as part of the programme.
Kate Foale, the leader of the Labour Group and Beeston councillor, added: "I think it is wonderful to see this finally has actually happened. Certainly the Labour administration in 2013, when Alan Rhodes was leader, actually got an initial tranche of funding to get this up and running in cooperation with Gedling Borough Council and Vernon Coaker, the then-MP.
"It has really been a cross-party effort and it is great to see it has actually happened."
Also responding to questions over the significant and additional costs she said: "It is a considerable amount but I think you have got to bear in mind the situation has changed, materials cost an awful lot more money, and clearly it is a shame and that money could have gone elsewhere but it really needed to happen."
