Highways Agency U-Turn: hopes for bored tunnel at Stonehenge
Submitted by Andy B on Thursday, 11 April 2002 Page Views: 1910
StonehengeTHE Government will consider making a road tunnel near Stonehenge much deeper than originally planned to avoid damaging Neolithic and Bronze Age remains.The Highways Agency, which manages England's trunk roads, has admitted that its previous proposal to excavate and then cover a 1.2-mile ditch only 200 yards from the stones would damage burial mounds and medieval field boundaries in the area.
The 'cut and cover' tunnelling method was chosen because it was estimated to be £20 million cheaper than boring a much deeper tunnel. Under the original plan, engineering works so near to the standing stones would have blighted the area for three years. However, the Highways Agency has now agreed to reconsider the costs and benefits of boring the tunnel and has asked the contractors Costain and Balfour Beatty to produce a report by July.
"It would be cheaper to do a 'cut and cover' but there is an issue over the extra environmental gain from a bored tunnel," Ed Bradley, the Highway Agency's project manager, said. He added that evidence was emerging that bored tunnels were cheaper than originally thought, and that the extra cost was likely to be closer to £10 million than £20 million.
However, the Highways Agency is resisting pressure from heritage and environmental groups to make the tunnel twice as long as planned because this could double the overall cost of £125 million for the seven-mile project.
A public inquiry into the scheme is likely to be held next year and construction could start in 2005, with the tunnel and new Winterbourne Stoke bypass opening in 2008.
By Ben Webster, Times Transport Correspondent
More: The Times
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