The bridge over the Spel Brook in the Southern Country Park has been closed since May 2023 – over 15 months!
We chased Herts CC’s Capital Works team this week and received the following progress report.
“The update on the Unsafe bridge: the works to remove the bridge have been delayed by the need to provide further information to the Environment Agency required to obtain the relevant permits. Hopefully the last additional survey has now been submitted to the EA and we should get a decision soon. Once we have the permit I will be looking for the contractor to consult on how quickly we can get on site. In terms of a new bridge, we should be able to apply to the EA for an exemption which has generally been a reasonably quick process and will allow us to go out to quote. Happy to provide more detail if required. Sorry that the process to date has been so slow up to this point.”
Slow progress is something of an understatement. I suspect we won’t see any progress on site until 2025.
