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Flash of hope for slow A96
Page 12
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SCOTLAND'S FIRST Minister Jack McConnell has raised hopes of a substantial upgrade to the notoriously slow A96 between Aberdeen and Inverness.
He says his "gut reaction" is to make the road a priority when Scotland's trunk road improvement programme is reviewed this summer.
His comments, made during a visit to Aberdeen, follow a similar expression of support for the scheme by Bristow Muldoon, convenor of the Scottish Parliament's transport and local government committee.
He told a forum of business and public sector leaders in Inverness that transport investment should not be concentrated in Scotland's central belt. After that meeting Highland councillor Sandy Park, a member
of the forum, said the A96 carries considerably more truck and car traffic than the A9 which has longer stretches of dual-carriageway.
"I don't think anybody in their wildest dreams would expect all of the A96 to be dualled within the next 10 years," he added. "It has to be done in stages." At present less than 20% of the 100-mile route is dualled — David Thomson of Inverness-based Highland Haulage says it takes a minimum of two-and-a-half
hours to complete the run.
"You are continually held up behind tractors and slow moving agricultural vehicles," he explains. "It's an absolute nightmare between Inverness and the airport.The road there is always gridlocked during the rush hour." Inverness-based owner-driver John Sinclair says: "There are lots of twists and turns and people won't sit behind a truck these days. They will overtake you, and as a truck driver you have to back off"