Residents fear plans to screen their homes from noise generated by the Aberdeen bypass will spoil their scenic views.
Contractors are starting the process of installing sound barrier fences and walls along 6.5 miles of the 28-mile, £750million road.
But people living in Milltimber’s Station Road have told Transport Scotland chiefs they do not want to lose their views of the River Dee and said they are concerned the measures will not even work.
John and Sheena Bevan, who live at the end of the suburb’s Station Road, have already raised their concerns at a meeting with representatives of the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route project.
The couple, who have lived in their home for 25 years, said a planned barrier parallel to their street would be just feet away from the windows of some properties.
Mr Bevan said: “We’ve tried to get detail from them for about a year or two about the proposed sound barrier.
“They’re only speaking to us because we’ve gone to them, we’ve been banging on for more than a year about this.
“We’ve presented our concerns about that on several fronts.
“We don’t know if it will be effective, or what the impact will be on people’s scenic views over the Dee Valley.
“There are five or six houses that you could consider to be on Station Road, and they are the ones that would be most affected by a sound barrier.”
Mrs Bevan said: “One of the worrying things for some of the residents is that because of the shape of their gardens it’ll be just feet away from their south-facing windows.
“So instead of having nice shrubs and birch trees, they’ll have a two-metre (6ft 5in) high wooden fence that probably won’t do the job it’s supposed to do anyway.”
Similar sound barriers will be put in place at hundreds of homes which lie close to the bypass route.
They will be formed of a mix of mounds of earth, timber fences and other blockades.
Deeside resident Professor Anthony Hawkins, former director of Aberdeen’s marine laboratory and a specialist in acoustics, said he had concerns over the suitability of the wooden fences.
He said: “It’s cheap to put up a wooden fence, and it might screen off sight of the traffic and very high frequency sound, but it won’t do anything to prevent the low frequency noise that comes from traffic.
“You need things that are thick and dense for that, and the best thing for that would be trees with a lot of low-down foliage, and hedges.
“Using mounds of earth would also be efficient, if it’s high enough.”
A Transport Scotland spokesman said: “During the development of the project, we have held a number of meetings with residents including those who live on Station Road.
“Where possible, the contractor’s design will accommodate the views of the residents and we understand that the contractor is currently engaging with residents for this purpose.”
