Contractors have been working overnight to resolve technical issues that have once again delayed the completion of the upgrade of a key junction on the outskirts of Bishop’s Stortford.
Essex County Council told the Indie the scheme being carried out by John Sisk & Son to upgrade junction 8 of the M11, which included replacing the roundabout at the intersection of the A120 with Birchanger Lane and Dunmow Road with a signalised junction, would be fully open on Thursday (June 13).
But with long-suffering residents ready to finally put the bunting out in celebration after several dates missed, the day came and went with no sign of the road being fully reopened or the traffic lights uncovered and the hundreds of cones taken away.
A spokesperson for Essex CC told the Indie on Friday“minor issues” had caused the latest delay to the scheme, and after we asked for details, on Tuesday they issued the following statement:
“The final element of the works is to test and commission the signals to enable them to become live, so enabling the right-hand turn and removing the traffic management. This is done over several nights, and the team identified several minor snagging points.”
Those were:
• resetting required on several chambers
• connector blocks to be repositioned
• new all-red detector to be installed on pole 3
• all-red detectors to be realigned and tested to ensure they cover the zones required to detect vehicle turning right from the side roads to just before the pedestrian crossing studs
• link cable to be transferred from pit into controller and wired in
• reinstatement required around Poles 1, 20 & 21
The spokesperson added: “The respective contractors have been on site, predominately overnight, rectifying these technical points and we expect these to be completed in the coming days. While we appreciate the frustration, it is not uncommon for there to be completion works required on a significant major highways scheme such as the J8 works.”
The scheme began in March 2022 and was originally due to be completed by September 2023.
The spokesperson said: “This date was however revised due to the significant delay to the start of the works due to poor weather and then issues in the early construction which included issues with unmapped utilities which required elements of the scheme to be redesigned and the team discovering significant damage to the drainage system, which we took the opportunity to rectify to save later works.”
Further delays occurred with dates of the end of last year, early May, end of May, and early June being missed.
After we requested details of cost Essex told us: “The project cost is £8.5m, funded through Essex County Council, the DfT, Stansted Airport, Cambridge and Peterborough LEP and the South East LEP.”
The spokesperson did not respond to our request for details of any financial penalties John Sisk & Son had incurred as a result of the contractor’s “sub-standard performance”.