The new chairman of north-east transport body Nestrans has claimed the completion of the long-awaited AWPR is not the end of multimillion-pound investment in the area.
The focus of the board over the next five years will be traffic and public transport in Aberdeen, the A96 route to Inverness and improving road and rail links to Ellon, Peterhead and Fraserburgh.
Peter Argyle, the deputy leader of Aberdeenshire Council, was elected as chairman of Nestrans at the board’s meeting yesterday.
The Liberal Democrat councillor said the priority of the partnership and the region, once the new bypass is completed this winter, must be ensuring the economic benefits of the project come to fruition.
Mr Argyle, who was deputy chairman of the organisation before the local government election in May, and has previously chaired the board, also said Nestrans is committed to delivering improvements to the A96 Aberdeen to Inverness route.
He said: “There has been a lot of progress in the last few years which is to be welcomed.
“We’re starting to get some movement on the rail projects, the line up to the north is happening, the line down to the central belt has serious funding that will make a big difference.
“The AWPR is becoming more impressive, and every time I go, there is really good progress. That really opens up the opportunity to look at in greater detail the way traffic will move around the city.
“We need to lock in the benefits, so we don’t end up with a super deluxe bypass and traffic stuck in the city centre. It gives the opportunity to get away from the spider’s web approach to public transport that everything comes to the city centre and goes out again.”
He said the immediate priority is ensuring the route of the A96 around Inverurie is right for the local community, including the “controversial” stretch near Bennachie.
In the long term Mr Argyle and his colleagues on the Nestrans board will consider how new technologies, including hydrogen-powered buses, electric cars and driverless vehicles, can be incorporated into Aberdeen and the surrounding country.
Alongside Mr Argyle, Aberdeen City councillor Sandra Macdonald and Margaret Bochel, director of infrastructure at Burness Paull LLP, were elected as vice chairwomen.
