Reason for Stockton Riverside Road road closure explained

Councillor Paul Rowling, deputy leader of Stockton Council, appealed for residents to be patient and “bear with us” with the closure of Riverside Road in Stockton from Monday, May 26. He said: “It’s not the ideal decision but we feel it’s the one we had to make in the best interests of the project and the borough.”

The council says the closure of the road and Riverside Car Park – until the end of the year – is the most cost-effective and efficient way of managing delays to the “transformational” Stockton Waterfront development with a riverside plaza, events spaces and play areas. The delays are said to have arisen because of cabling difficulties discovered by Virgin Media.

Cllr Rowling, who is also the council’s cabinet member for resources and transport and represents the town centre ward, said: “Clearly this is a decision that’s going to impact some people in terms of the road closing, but we felt like it was the only decision we could make really.

“The park is something we’re really proud of and we think it’s a first in the country and it’s going to be a trailblazer. We’re absolutely determined it is to be delivered on time and within the allocated budget we set.

“I’m just focused on what we can control, and that’s getting the park finished, ensuring it’s in the allocation and businesses and residents start to benefit from it.”

So what went wrong? Rewind to last November when Virgin Media arrived on site, on schedule, to start its work to divert services. But according to the council, they were surprised to find service media they were not expecting.

Iain Robinson, assistant director for town centre development, said: “There’s a series of services running through a site of that size and responsibility for diversion of that service media sits with the utility providers. You’ve got Virgin Media fibre optic cables running through the site which require them to come and divert them.

“Unfortunately when they’ve committed to do those works, scheduled for November last year, they’ve arrived at site, run into some difficulties that they haven’t been able to resolve quickly.

“The extent and the other end of that connection of those cables wasn’t as they expected them to be. There were probably more cables in the ducting than they were expecting.”

The council makes no criticism of Virgin Media, saying they were faced with an unexpected find on the site. It says the situation moved out of the authority’s hands as a national team from the utility company had to be called in to deal with the complex cable connections.

The job had to wait its turn, not helped by the Christmas period and the “wet season” in January, and was completed in March.

Delays to “service diversions” had been identified as the biggest risk in the project, and allowances were made for this. Nevertheless the council says the type of technical problem encountered here is regarded as unforeseen.

Asked why it was not anticipated, Cllr Rowling said: “We’re told the information about what they thought was there. They’ve gone [to the site], it’s different, I think it’s unreasonable to expect us to be able to project something based on assurances we’ve been given, and ultimately those assurances weren’t 100% correct.

“There is a risk register, risks have been put down, but ultimately we create that register like any organisation does based on the information we’re supplied by other organisations. The utilities company found it’s not what they expected to be there.”

Mr Robinson added: “We accept these things can happen, however we’re taking steps to mitigate it as best we can. We accept it is a risk that comes with capital schemes.

“The work was concluded in March. We could then start to focus what a programme of works looks like across the site. Certain phases of work needed to be deferred or delayed.”

They said they had to weigh up the options and implications of a road closure in the complex process of mapping out the forthcoming year’s works in the third and final phase of a project with a £23.5m construction budget. Mr Robinson said: “The alternative option was to extend into the summer, which would take it well beyond when we’d planned to finish.

“We arrived at the conclusion that this is the most effective means of dealing with that delay.”

Cllr Rowling said the road closure was not on the cards before and they had planned to keep it open throughout the project: “But we are where we are.

“We’re going to control what we can control effectively. It’s our priority to look forward to getting the park open on time within the timescales and budget originally proposed.

“I value every single penny of taxpayers’ money very very seriously, and for me it’s about getting it finished and ensuring it’s delivered within the original allocation.”

If the road were not closed, he said: “We’d be looking at a delay certainly, and we’d also be looking at increased financial costs as well. That’s just not something we wanted to do.

“The park’s really starting to take shape now. You can really see the distinct features of it. As we go to summer and we can really get on with it, residents will start to see exactly what it’s going to be.

“I’m just really keen once we get into next year for us to be on time, so people can bring their kids down to the state-of-the-art facilities and we can have the economic benefits to businesses. I wasn’t prepared to delay it.”

When it comes to the disruption it will cause, the council predicts there will be “limited impact” to traffic flow. It says diversions will still allow people to get to where they need, with other routes remaining open.

The council says the traffic will be monitored and maintains it has taken all the steps it can and is open to adapting its measures when they see how it works out in practice.

Cllr Rowling said traffic modelling had been carried out: “It shows that the network around the area is able to cope with the extra volume of traffic. Having said that, there’s probably going to be some changes in behaviour as well.

“We have got stuff that’s able to monitor this and can be very responsive and pro-active. If we need to make some slight changes to timing of lights etc we’ll do it. We’re going to manage it as best we can.”

Cllr Rowling said businesses had been consulted: “There are plans for signage. There’ll be regular communication.

“There is a full programme to ensure they continue to be consulted. There is alternative access for some businesses that we are working through. I think the businesses are going to benefit from the scheme being completed.

“I’ve appealed to the public to be patient with us and potentially leave the house 10 minutes early if needs be or slightly modify their journey. Whilst appreciating there will be some disruption, we hope people will bear with us and plan their journeys.

“Something could happen but we strongly believe by taking this measure it gives us the best opportunity to open the park exactly when we want to.”

The council says the closure of Riverside Car Park, which has 111 spaces, can be absorbed by other long-stay provision as its occupancy was described as relatively low.

A Virgin Media spokesperson said: “We understand how important it is to minimise disruption, but with large-scale construction projects involving significant cabling diversions, there’s always a risk of unforeseen challenges. In this case, our teams encountered unexpected technical issues on site that required additional time, specialist expertise, and resources to resolve—ensuring there was limited impact to our customers.

“The work has now been completed as quickly and safely as possible.”