A long-awaited by-pass to take traffic away from the congestion of Denny Cross has finally been given the go-ahead - with work expected to start later in the year.
Work on the Denny Eastern Access Road (DEAR) is expected to start later this year, following a successful Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) on land vital to the £7.5million project.
Local councillor Paul Garner said he is delighted with the outcome, saying the project has already been delayed far longer than he had hoped, after unexpected objections were made to the CPO.
"If it hadn't been for the objections, we'd have been driving on it by now," he said.
But after much frustration, he's delighted that the Scottish Government reporters found in the council's favour and have allowed the compulsory purchase order to go ahead.
Cllr Garner said: “This is an important milestone in this project and represents many years of challenging work getting to this stage where a by-pass road is a reality for residents in the Denny community.
"It has taken a long time to get to here - a lot longer than I thought due to the objections coming in, but they have all been removed and addressed.
"The journey hasn’t been easy but we are now coming to the end of the CPO process, and can move on with appointing a contractor and seeing work start on site later this year”.
The route - between Broad Street and Glasgow Road - aims to ease congestion and reduce air pollution in the town centre by diverting a large number of vehicles from the town centre.
It's a project that has been discussed for more than 30 years and Cllr Garner said it has been one of his major goals since being elected as a councillor.
Falkirk Council says that it will also provide sustainable travel routes to Denny High School and includes links to the existing core path network allowing better access for leisure and recreation use.
Once completed the road will also provide an access route for the many new homes being built as part of the Mydub 1 development and any future homes on the Mydub 2 site both identified in the Council’s latest Local Development Plan in that location .
A tender for the work will be issued in the coming months with work expected to start in November 2022.
Funding for the scheme will come from Falkirk Council and local developer contributions.
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