Work has started to clear an Aberdeenshire woodlands’ car park months after a construction firm went into liquidation – leaving the site “a mess”.
Part of Caroline Wells Woods car park in Ellon was turned into to a mini-construction site earlier this year, with fencing, containers and materials lying around.
The company – Muirfield Contracts – was carrying out maintenance work on nearby houses but went into liquidation in March.
The site was left unused and fell into disarray.
The woods form part of McDonald Park, the largest green space in Ellon.
Aberdeenshire Council has now removed the containers following complaints from locals, including Ellon councillor Gillian Owen.
She said: “The company who was carrying out work for the council, updating kitchens and the like, went into liquidation.
Sadly everything was put on hold waiting for the administrator to act.
“They went bust and all their stuff and containers were left in the car park for months. I don’t think we should be using a council car park like that for that sort of purpose. It should have been sorted out much sooner then it was.
“It is just such a mess, it still is. There is still a huge amount of mess there.”
She is now calling for the rest of the site to be cleared.
Aberdeenshire Council’s head of transportation, Ewan Wallace, said: “Permission was given to the council’s property service for a contractor to house containers here while they were undertaking repairs.
“It is not uncommon for permission to be granted to property, housing or other council services, or contractors working on their behalf, to allow works to be undertaken that benefit the wider community.
“It is unfortunate that in this situation it appears the company went out of business, resulting in the containers remaining in-situ for longer than originally anticipated.”
Chairwoman of the Friends of MacDonald Park, Lynn Gilbert, said: “Well obviously we’d like it to be as it used to be. I think having containers sitting there has compacted the drive. I think it is quite pot-holey as well.
“We’d like to to have a proper surface that people can park there. Having said that it is not that busy especially now the academy moved. I think people from the academy used to park there.
“If the containers are gone that is a good thing.”
Nearly 260 people lost their jobs when Muirfield Contracts went into administration.