Hereford’s planned Eastern Access Road moves closer

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Thursday, 26 May 2022 17:00

By Gavin McEwan - Local Democracy Reporter

A Google aerial view of the area where the new crossing will go. The specifics have yet to be decided.

Hereford’s planned eastern access road and river crossing have taken a step closer.

Herefordshire Council has just approved a £45,000 contract with engineering firm Aecom, funded by a government grant, to “progress initial feasibility” for the scheme.

The work will firm up the evidence base for the project, set priorities, and look at how it could be accelerated and funded.

The council said its own “limited internal capacity and expertise” meant it was “critical” to bring in support from elsewhere for “to develop and deliver this first phase of technical work” to progress the road plan.

The work “will help limit financial risks and potentially abortive technical work,” it added.

It has however appointed its own senior project manager “to support the delivery of the project”, which “will be overseen by the appropriate project delivery board to provide additional assurance and oversight”, the council explained.

This follows recent publication of a highly critical investigation into the council’s last major road-building scheme in the city, the link road between Edgar Street and Commercial Road, on which costs were not monitored and contracts poorly managed.

First mooted 10years ago, the planned road would connect the Rotherwas industrial estate to the southeast of the city, to Ledbury Road in the north-east, across a new bridge over the river Wye.

The council allocated £400,000 last June to bring the road project forward, as part of a £1.2 million package of transport measures.