Residents fume over Block-ed Lane

Photo: Picture: DARREN ROBINSON

WRONG side of the tracks . . . Geraldine Hartshorn and son Louis (3) by the Block Lane bridge, now closed until spring by Metrolink work.

Residents of Block Lane, Chadderton, are furious after being told that their road could be closed for Metrolink work for another 14 months.

But the delay, posted in an Oldham Council public notice in the Chronicle, is likely to be only five months.

The extra time is to allow Metrolink staff to keep the road closed if the contract has to be extended again.

Even this is unacceptable, according to resident Geraldine Hartshorn, whose daily trips to nursery with her son, Louis (3), have been disrupted by the closure.

The road has been impassable since July. Residents also have to put up with the closure of Jammy Lane until Christmas, and traffic lights in Oxford Road, at two other bridge works. They expected Block Lane to reopen on Monday.

Ms Hartshorn said they had been counting down to the day, but their hopes were dashed when they saw Wednesday’s public notice with a 58-week deadline for installation of a new cantilever walkway.

Ms Hartshorn, who has set up a Facebook page to call for the work to be speeded up, has emailed her three ward councillors and Oldham West and Royton MP Michael Meacher for support.

She said: “Even after an hour the Facebook page had 22 people signed up. This closure is making residents’ lives a misery because of long-winded diversions on narrow pot-holed side streets. Even five more months is bad.

“It used to be a bus route and it is terrible for mums taking children to nursery or school.

“We have all been on countdown, and no one’s had a letter to tell them the date’s been changed.

“Why can’t we have a partial reopening with temporary traffic lights?

“We didn’t mind a few weeks because Metrolink is a good thing, but residents have been patient and waited four and a half months.”

Councillor Fida Hussain said: “This is ridiculous. We need to make sure this is done as speedily as possible.”

Councillor Shoab Akhtar said: “The council needs to look at more clearly signposted and better diversions.”

A Metrolink spokesman said a steel girder in the bridge was in a worse state, and needed more refurbishment, than was anticipated.

Although the pavement underneath will stay open, because of health and safety concerns the road cannot be reopened.

Newsletters are going out to local residents, and the bridge is expected to reopen in April next year.

An Oldham Council spokesman explained that the order was for 58 weeks to save costs and give the contractors extra time if the work overruns.