Aberdeen councillors could next week sign off on the use of compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) to secure land for a long-awaited roads project in the city – in a bid to boost the local economy during the coronavirus crisis.
The massive, multi-million-pound South College Street improvements are more than a decade in the works.
Preparing a report on the proposals for members, a senior council roads engineer Alan Mckay said the order being issued for the major works would be a way to “support the construction industry” during the crisis.
On Wednesday, an urgent business meeting will be asked to back a CPO for five sections of land to free up three key areas.
A small section of trapped land is being sought to connect South College Street with North Esplanade West by extending Palmerston Place, which would be expanded with an extra lane under the plans.
Two other areas – between Wellington Place and South College Street and a square in the middle of South College Street, Millburn Street and Bank Street – are also in line to be acquired.
Those purchases would make way for an additional lane of traffic, boosting the capacity at the busy junction.
In 2017, officials estimated it would cost around £5.5 million to build.
No homes of businesses lie on the targeted land, which are the only remaining plots the council needs to gain control of ahead of construction beginning.
Efforts to have the owners voluntarily sell the land will continue alongside the CPO bids, officers said, if councillors back the move next week.
The work, aimed at removing traffic from the city centre, was first spoken of in 2004 but has been delayed many times in the last 16 years.
While CPOs could be issued by the end of spring, it could still take up to 18 months for a final decision to be made by Scottish government ministers if there are objections to the order.
It comes after planning minister Kevin Stewart indicated a “fall-off” in projects being progressed to the stage of sourcing contractors during the coronavirus lockdown.
The government intervention has also prompted officers to prepare a list of road projects, worth more than £13.2 million, for councillors to rubber stamp at the same meeting.
Those works – already budgeted for in annual spending plans – include maintenance on the A92 and A96, which recently came under council responsibility, bridge repairs, new traffic lights and pedestrian crossings and road resurfacing schemes.
A report by traffic engineering manager Doug Ritchie reads: “The approval of the programme is part of our Covid-19 economic response to stimulate the local economy through our material suppliers, consultants and local contractors, as the schemes are moved forward and commissioned.”
