Transport Insights

Returning to the subject of money down the drain, Shropshire Council Council is finally set to scrap one half of a controversial new road on which it has burned £32m of taxpayers’ money.

I wrote about the Shrewsbury North West  extensively at Highways magazine, including the controversy over the possible contamination to the town’s water supply and the fake claim by the then transport secretary that the scheme was fully funded with money saved by curtailing HS2.

Better Shrewsbury Transport (BeST) have done an amazing job calling out all the problems with…building new roads in a climate emergency.

Now Shropshire County Council has announced:

A report on the future of the Shrewsbury North West Relief Road (NWRR) will be presented to the meeting of Shropshire Council’s full Council on Thursday 26 February [2026]. The report will recommend to Council the cancellation of the NWRR due to it being unaffordable.

But it adds:

For clarity, the NWRR refers only to the part-funded Department for Transport (DfT) section of the road from Holyhead Road to Battlefield. The western section (A5 Churncote to Holyhead Road or “Oxon Link Road”), is currently subject to a separate assessment of options and further announcements on this will be made in due course.

Work on the proposed relief road has been paused since June 2025, after it was confirmed with the DfT that no further Government funding would be made available for the scheme.

As a result, the NWRR project is deemed unaffordable, given the council’s current financial position and with forecast costs rising from the original £74.2m estimate to £162.4m following planning delays and global construction cost increases.

BeST and others are unhappy that the council (now LibDem led) still hasn’t scrapped the Oxon Link Road.

And, as the BBC reports:

The DfT is yet to decide whether the council will have to pay back the £32m already spent on the project.

The cash-strapped authority would have to use some of its recently awarded government loan to cover the cost, should the DfT request that its funding awarded in 2019 is returned.

A spokesperson told me that this refers to exceptional financial support confirmed on Monday, which allows it to balance and set its budget today, but that it included in this “ask” was money that the council has already spent on the NWRR.