Moray Councillors have abandoned plans to build a new rail crossing and link road in Elgin, it has been announced.

A vote was held to decide whether to pull the project from the capital plan, which resulted in 13-11 in favour of dropping the proposals.

The £8.5 million project would have helped provide access for 200 'affordable' homes and a further 250 privates homes in the pipeline.

It was designed to cope with the projected growth in traffic numbers over the next ten years.

However, opponents of the scheme felt it could not be a priority over other projects due to the capital plan being described as 'unsustainable' by senior officers.

-- Advertisement --

This follows reductions in government grants and increased costs for providing services.

As a result, if the council cannot provide alternative access to the affordable homes site it will have to repay £2.7m plus interest to the Grampian Housing Association for land sold to the council for that purpose.

In addition, £652,000 in developer contributions may have to be reimbursed to house builders who may not now be able to develop areas that would have been serviced by the new road and crossing.

Council Leader Stewart Cree voted to keep the project in the plan, stating it would be a 'grave error' to abandon the project which was identified as a council priority.

In addition, Cllr John Cowe supported Cllr Cree, stating: "The road would have generated an estimated £6m in council tax revenues, and a potential boost to the local economy of £100m."

He added that a new crossing would have to built at some stage, it will now simply cost more.

(LM)