A continuous cycling and walking path between Dundee and Monifieth will come closer to fruition next week.
Councillors sitting on the city development committee at Dundee City Council are due to meet to discuss the proposals on Monday and have been asked to approve a number of elements of the plan.
The committee is being asked to consider a ‘stopping up order’ for Mill Street in Broughty Ferry, which would see the road closed off to cars completely, and see it officially removed from the list of public roads.
The £9 million coastal path would then be upgraded, including the street lighting, in a bid to encourage active travel between Dundee and Monifieth.
Councillor Mark Flynn, convener of city development at Dundee City Council, said: “The whole £9m scheme is made up of a number of different elements, all of which need to come together to complete what is an ambitious and unparalleled investment in active travel in the area.
“Improved paths and street lighting, in this case between Stannergate and Douglas Terrace and the Balmossie Street to Seven Arches Link, will also demonstrate our physical commitment to ensuring that the right infrastructure is in place to support and encourage people out of their fossil fuel burning vehicles and on to more active ways of getting around.
“Closing Mill Street, while maintaining access to Broughty Ferry beach car park from Esplanade, provides a vehicle free connection from Windmill Gardens to Castle Green which allows the creation of a cycle, walking and running shared path all the way along the Esplanade away from vehicles.
“These developments signal a radical change to the whole face of active travel in that part of the Ferry and beyond.”
A central part of this project would be connecting Windmill Gardens to Broughty Ferry’s Castle Green, and creating a new bridge over the Dighty on the Monifieth section of the route.
At the meeting councillors will also be asked to approve £168,860 worth of upgrades to the path surface and street lighting between Balmossie Street, Inchkeith Avenue and Incholm Drive.
This work is expected to start this spring and be finished by early summer 2021.
Tayside Contracts has also been recommended to carry out £452,613 of upgrades to street lighting on the route between Stannergate and Douglas Terrace.
If councillors also approve this, work could start in June and be completed within three months.
Should the proposals be approved by the council, vehicles travelling between Broughty Ferry and Monifieth would be re-routed via Brook Street instead.
This project will be funded by the Scottish Government through Sustrans Scotland’s places for everyone programme.
At the meeting councillors will also be asked to officially ‘stop up’ some sections of footpath in Charleston due to a new housing development.
