Council ‘confident’ new River Trent bridge will be built by 2026 after ‘choppy’ delays

The proposed bridge over the River Trent (NCC)
By Joe Locker, Local Democracy Reporter
The deputy leader of Nottingham City Council says he is ‘confident’ the new pedestrian and cycle bridge over the River Trent will finally be built by 2026.
The crossing between Lady Bay and Trent Basin first due to be completed in spring 2023, but the 85m-long bridge has been hit by several delays.
Costs have also increased from the original budget of just over £9m, to up to £18m.
Linking Trent Basin, off Daleside Road in the city, to the south bank of the river in Lady Bay, Rushcliffe, it is hoped the bridge will become a “significant new landmark”.
It will also become the first new crossing built over the Trent in Nottingham in more than 65 years.
City councillors gave the project the final go-ahead at an Executive Board meeting on Tuesday (October 22).
Cllr Ethan Radford (Lab), the deputy leader of the council, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I’m quite confident now.
“We’ve just approved it at Executive Board and we expect to have it done by 2026.”
A full planning application was submitted by Nottingham City Council earlier this year in February, and councillors unanimously supported the proposals at a meeting in April.
Rushcliffe Borough Council, which is in charge of the land on the Lady Bay side, later gave plans the green light at a planning committee meeting in July.
The project is being funded by the Government’s Transforming Cities Fund, however some of the funding is yet to be confirmed by the Department for Transport.
Council documents say this is because the scheme is now being delivered outside of grant funding deadlines.
“It has been a bit choppy at the moment in terms of getting the funding in line from the Government, but we are there now,” Cllr Radford said.
The rising costs have been largely put down to inflation, with materials now costing much more than they did when the project was first tabled.
Cllr Radford added: “Part of the problem was when we had the valuation done for the first time it was a number of years ago, obviously over time prices have gone up.
“We’ve had inflation, the cost of raw materials, in [the same] way that you would have a house valued four years ago and have it valued now, the costs would have gone up in between.
“It is not necessarily a budgetary problem, but more a case that things are more expensive now than they were then.”
Contractor Balfour Beatty will submit a final price to construct the bridge in December, and a contract will only be entered once a fixed price has been determined.
The steel bridge is expected to be lifted into place in November 2025, while the surrounding public realm will be finished off by spring 2026.
Cllr Pavlos Kotsonis (Lab) said he was reassured CCTV will be installed on the site to deter anti-social behaviour.
“It is such an important asset to link up the county and the city in that way with no cost to the taxpayer,” he added.
Nottinghamshire County Council decided it would not be making any financial contributions to the construction costs or future maintenance of the new bridge.
All future maintenance costs for the new bridge will fall to Nottingham City Council.
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