This BBC article reports that the Beeston section of the tram is SEVEN MONTHS behind schedule. So I was wrong when I mentioned three months in a previous article.
They now reckon the Beeston work will finish at the end of May 2014. It should have been done by last October! In the meantime, traders are complaining that “compensation” is inadequate (I put that in inverted commas, because for it to be true compensation it would have to make good all shortfalls in earnings caused as a result. And it hasn’t). Chilwell Road has been closed since March 2013 – so more than a year by the time it reopens.
Project director for Taylor Woodrow Alstom, Michael Anderson, said: “We understand it’s very difficult for traders but we were unable to do the work in a different time frame. It’s very regrettable that it’s taken so long.”
Isn’t it just? And the article adds a couple more months by concluding:
All roads in Beeston should be fully reopened by July, the firm said, with trams running to and from Nottingham by the end of 2014.
So they’re still clinging to the end of the year, are they? I’ll ask what I asked previously: if you can still finish by the end of 2014 as originally planned, HAVING LOST SEVEN UNFORESEEN MONTHS IN BETWEEN TIMES, why the hell did you PLAN to cause the disruption for so long in the first place?
Nottingham’s tram is a monumental waste of money. It isn’t green. It is destroying lives and businesses. It is destroying this city. And it will continue to do so.