Video: Work on Grantham bypass steps up with arrival of 540 lorry loads of material

Work on the Grantham Southern Relief Road stepped up last week with the arrival of 10,000 tonnes of material on site.

The equivalent of 540 lorry loads is now at the site ready to be compacted and used to create the new road.

A thirty-eight tonne excavator and eighteen tonne bulldozer have been brought in and a sample section laid and compacted so that it can be tested for strength.

Additional workforce and equipment is also being bought in as work increases on site.

Elsewhere the existing footpath has been removed on the east side of the B1174 and trial holes have been drilled on either side of the road in order to locate utilities.

At the western end of the scheme, heading towards the A1, trees have been cleared and top soil stripped. Archaeologists will inspect a sample area.

There will be temporary traffic lights on the B1174 until December 2015.

Following a tender process, it was announced last month that Lincolnshire County Council had awarded Fitzgerald Civil Engineering the £3.6m contract to build the first section of the Grantham Southern Relief Road.

Work began three weeks ago on phase one of what is known as the King31 section, with cabins, hoardings and temporary fencing erected.

This phase of the project will include the creation of a roundabout off the B1174 and a new section of road westwards towards the A1 along Tollemache Road, culminating with a second roundabout.

Following completion of phase one, a further two phases of the relief road will take place at a later date with the entire road expected to be operational by 2019.

Les Outram, senior project leader, said: “The budget for the whole scheme, the current estimate is of the order of £80 million.” He added: “This relief road will relieve the town centre of those heavy goods vehicles, relieve the town centre of the congestion, help the town centre to grow, and then with the land adjacent to the Southern Relief Road it will provide further growth in both housing and employment terms.”

The project is being led by Lincolnshire County Council and is supported by South Kesteven District Council, the Greater Lincolnshire LEP, Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) and local businesses.