Tramworks restart to trigger delays 18 | 08 | 2011

EDINBURGH DRIVERS should prepare themselves; work is about to restart on the ill-fated trams project. The result will be interminable delays for motorists as the next phase of tram line building goes ahead in the city.

If councillors agree to press ahead with the scheme to the city centre next week, traffic will be diverted around the work in Haymarket and Shandwick Place until NEXT spring.

If there's a shard of good news, it's that the start of the work signals the first tangible sign of progress on the ill-fated construction project since the resolution of a bitter two-year dispute between city council tram developers Tie and contractors led by German firm Bilfinger Berger.

Unless you've been living on the moon for the last 24 months, you will know the dispute centred on the cost of changes to the scheme. The row has delayed the opening of even a truncated line until 2014 and could hike the cost to £773 million from its £545m budget.

Comment: Pull the plug on the trams

The latest work, due to start on Saturday, September 10, will include track laying and the erection of the first overhead power lines on the Edinburgh Airport-St Andrew Square route, originally planned to Newhaven.

While westbound will be unaffected, eastbound traffic will be diverted via Magdala Crescent, Eglinton Crescent and Palmerston Place.

The traffic problems will, however, start a fortnight earlier as advance work to install new traffic lights gets underway.

Traders, who have been informed of the planned works, have been advised the start date "is subject to change pending a decision on the tram project by the council on 25 August".

A spokesman for Tie confirmed the work depended on a formal resolution of the dispute with a revised contract with the construction consortium.

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Craig James