Demand for end date over 'fiasco' in Central Park

OPPOSITION councillors in Plymouth have demanded an end date and schedule of works for the problem-hit Central Parks ponds project, so the city council can move on from the "sorry saga".

- By ALISON STEPHENSON

The scheme, part of a £9 million park regeneration signed off back in 2017 to address flooding issues in the Barn Park area, has suffered continual delays due to weather and contractor issues since work started three years ago.

Residents said they felt “fobbed off and ignored” by a lack of communication and action by the council as they saw their beloved park turn into a stalled building site over two summers.

They presented a ‘fix our park’ petition of 3,000 names to the council’s housing and community services scrutiny panel at the end of last year which apologised over the issues and recommended a comprehensive communications plan was developed with regular updates on the website and QR codes at the site to address concerns.

A meeting this week heard that there were further delays this year in completing the playing pitch works which were “outside the council’s control” after the contractor quit over a “conflicting interpretation of the project”.

A new contractor has been appointed and started work on the final stage of the project at the end of June. The work will take 12 weeks, subject to weather conditions.

However, this would be followed by final landscaping work including reseeding fields and tree planting at the “appropriate time of year”.