Ayrshire Roads Alliance's budget for 2023/24 will be increased by almost £4m, according to East Ayrshire Council bosses.

East Ayrshire Council’s Cabinet recently agreed the Ayrshire Roads Alliance’s programme of investment works that will allow improvement works to be carried out to carriageways, footways and street lighting, in addition to bridge strengthening and investment in transportation, road safety and fleet vehicles.

The overall roads budget will increase from £10.738m to £14.440m due to the budget being re-profiled.

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This multi-million pound investment will see £3.240m being allocated for carriageway structural maintenance; £0.25m each for footway structural maintenance and street lighting improvement schemes; £4.1m for bridge and culvert strengthening; £2.666m for New Cumnock Flood Scheme and £2.719m for Kilmarnock car parks. 

There was also an additional £400,000 allocated from Repairs and Renewals at the council two weeks ago for pavements and roads.

Traffic, Transportation and Road Safety improvement programmes will be delivered in partnership with Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT), Transport Scotland and SUSTRANS, with a focus on improving road safety, enhancing the transport network and promoting accessible travel choices.

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This will include expanding the School Streets programme which is now being trialled at Netherthird Primary after the successful pilots at Catrine Primary and St Sophia’s Primary. Large-scale projects will also continue over the next year, including the New Cumnock flood scheme.

The scheme was originally due to finish in November 2022, but that was then pushed back until February 2023, due to supply issues.

There has been no further update about a completion date for this scheme.

READ MORE: Roadworks in place between Cumnock and New Cumnock

Councillor Neal Ingram, Cabinet Spokesperson for Roads, said: “The roads infrastructure is one of the council’s most valuable assets and it is vital to the economic wellbeing and development of East Ayrshire, contributing significantly to the local economy and regeneration.

“By re-profiling current available budgets, we have been able to sustain the significant increased and necessary investment in our infrastructure. This increased funding will ensure that we have a strong focus on addressing the quality of the infrastructure asset and that we are responding to the needs of our communities.”