Yarborough Road Repairs – Long Leys Road – Whitton Park

As many will be aware, Yarborough Road is suffering from subsidence, with clear evidence of this at the bus stop by Whitton(s) Park.

Lincolnshire County Council (LCC) are having to undertake urgent maintenance works at the top of Whitton(s) Park to restore structural integrity to the adjacent highway and pedestrian footpath. The existing retaining walls that hold the layby and road in place have been moving for a number of years and have now reached the point where intervention is required to prevent the creation of serious safety issues.

Major engineering work will be required to complete the road repairs and these will start in the next few weeks, managed by the County Council Highways team. Access for the heavy construction equipment will be needed via Long Leys Road and up footpath No. 6, which runs alongside Whitton(s) Park up to the Yarborough Road.

Summary of work affecting Whitton(s) Park:

• As part of their legal duty to maintain the highway, LCC are proposing to remove the existing retaining walls at the top of the park and replace them with a reinforced earth embankment. This solution is intended to tie seamlessly into the park itself.
• The footprint of the works will extend beyond that of the existing retaining walls and will result in the need for 10 trees to be removed to make way for the new reinforced  earth solution. There will also be a requirement to undertake facilitative works to 3 additional trees to allow the required machinery the space to construct the new  embankment.
• LCC have agreed to replace all trees that are scheduled for removal. The city council have identified desired species and tree sizes that LCC utilise in their re-planting schedule. The possible supply and planting of any other additional trees is still to be confirmed.

The tree removal works will start on Monday 9 March for up to three days. As part of this, Stop/Go boards will be in use as needed to allow access for the contractor. An area in the park near to the works will also be cordoned off to ensure the safety of members of the public. Lincolnshire County Council Highways advise: We always do everything we can to avoid taking down trees but, in this instance, it’s essential to the safety repairs we need to carry out here. We’ll also be planting ten new trees in the park when we’re finished our repair works. The tree works are being carried out by City of Lincoln Council on behalf of Lincolnshire County Council.

During the essential repairs to Yarborough Road, it is anticipated that footpath No. 6 will need to be temporarily improved to take heavy construction equipment from Long Leys Road and up the footpath. A positive point is that this will leave a well-compacted surface for any proposed resurfaced footpath, hopefully with a more even gradient and camber up to Yarborough Road.

There could also well be construction materials stored by the disused toilet in Whitton Park.

Further information, including the traffic management plan for Yarborough Road, will be shared when LLRA have it.