Residents urged to have their say about decade-long delay to enhancement plan

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Opening of the Adur Ferry Bridge on Wednesday. ENGSUS00120131113145925 — S47525H13 Opening of the Adur Ferry Bridge on Wednesday. ENGSUS00120131113145925

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Shoreham residents are being urged to make their views known on the lengthy delays to enhancement plans for the town which were agreed ten years ago but have yet to be started.

The hold-up in the work to improve the safety and appearance of the area at the southern end of the town’s new Adur Ferry Bridge was branded ‘a disgrace’ by one resident at a meeting in May.

Now townspeople have the chance to ask more questions about the scheme, which also includes a facelift for the nearby Ferry Road shops area, and about a recent spate of vandalism which has seen 19 glass panels on the new bridge broken.

The issues will be discussed on Thursday next week by senior councillors and officers of Adur and Worthing and West Sussex County councils, MP Tim Loughton, police and the Environment Agency.

Although the new bridge opened in November, 2013, the councils involved have been unable so far to agree on improvements at its southern end, where it meets the Lower Beach Road car park, and enhancements to the Ferry Road shops area. Recurring vandalism to the bridge has further dismayed the community.

At an Adur County Local Committee meeting in May, Shoreham resident David Featherstone criticised the delays and accused the two local authorities of ‘blaming each other’. He added: “The bridge was completed in 2013 and still nothing has been done.

“Twice a day I go past it and I can see what it’s like, it’s a mess. It’s a disgrace.”

The improvements were first agreed in 2006 as part of the Shoreham Renaissance Document.

Thursday’s meeting, in public, of Adur and Worthing Councils’ joint overview and scrutiny committee, is at 6.30pm, at the Shoreham Centre, Pond Road. Officials and elected representatives will each be given five minutes to address the issues and time will also be allocated for responding to the public’s questions, which must be submitted in advance of the meeting, by Tuesday, at 5pm, to [email protected]

Committee chairman Stephen Chipp urged everyone interested in the issues to ask their questions.

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