25 June 2001

STRENGTHENING WORK TO EAST BRIDGE STREET ARCHES

Roads Service is advising motorists of lane closures on East Bridge Street throughout the summer to allow essential work to be carried out.

Work to strengthen the foundations of the East Bridge Street arches, which are in need of urgent repair, will take place from Monday, 2 July until Friday, 31 August 2001.

Throughout this period, Roads Service will also be taking the opportunity to widen East Bridge Street to enable the completion of 130 metres of bus lane.

During the period of the works, city bound traffic will be able to access Belfast city centre via East Bridge Street by two lanes in the peak period, which may be reduced to one lane off-peak. There will be three weekend closures that will be published in the press two weeks prior to the closures.

Between July and August, all country-bound traffic will not have access to East Bridge Street. Instead, all traffic will be diverted via Albert Square, Donegall Quay, Queen Elizabeth Bridge, Middlepath Street and Short Strand. Signs showing these diversions will be erected prior to the diversions becoming operational.

Access from the city centre will be available to local business and residential areas during the works.

The footway on the Central Station side of East Bridge Street will be closed between Central Station and Stewart Street. However, the footway on the opposite side will be open throughout the progression of the works.

A spokesperson for Roads Service said: "It is inevitable that the project will cause some inconvenience to traffic. However, every effort has been made to minimise the disruption by programming the scheme to coincide with reduced traffic flows during the summer months and phasing the works to maintain reasonable traffic flow as much as possible."

NOTES TO EDITORS:

Discussions have taken place with Translink and they will publish a separate notice to highlight the diverted bus routes to their customers.