Welcome For Highland Transport Plans

Good News For A9 - A96 & A82 Travellers

EWING WELCOMES SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT PROPOSALS FOR TRANSPORT INVESTMENT - AT LONG LAST A PLAN WHICH PROVIDES A FAIR DEAL FOR THE HIGHLANDS
Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East Nairn and Lochaber has today welcomed the SNP Government plans for road and rail projects for the Highlands over the next twenty years.
He said:
"I have campaigned all my life for a fair deal for the Highlands - to improve our road and rail links. For the first time ever, we now learn of major plans for the North. The plan includes the A9, A96 and A82 - all vital arteries. And it promises major improvements for the rail connections from Perth to Inverness and from Inverness to Aberdeen.
At a time of financial pressures, and when the Forth Bridge needs to be replaced, it is a huge sign of the SNP Government's support for the Highlands that we have done so well out of this announcement. It is the culmination of decades of campaigning on my part.
Improvements to the A9 and A82 will provide vital links between the north and south of Scotland. They will be welcomed by everyone in Scotland - but hugely welcome in my own constituency, which I have represented now for nearly ten years.
In addition I hope to see the trunk link route proceeded with, from the A96 to the A9, which will enable the UHI campus and rail halt to be delivered.
This planned investment in the road and rail links brings to an end the neglect that we saw previously, under the former Labour Lib Administration in the Highlands. During their time in office, they did not deliver any major improvements in the rail links with the south, nor to any of the main arterial links with the south - the A82 A96 or A9.
Instead they invested in schemes like the Edinburgh Tram scheme, which is a monumental waste of money, and hugely unpopular even in Edinburgh - and which the SNP Government sought to scrap. Sadly all other parties insisted the £500 M be ploughed in. They also proposed the Edinburgh Airport Rail link plan which may have cost more than the Millennium Dome - more than one thousand million pounds. Fortunately, following my advocacy that this was a gigantic waste of cash, the scheme was, after the election of the SNP Government scrapped.
Had it not been for that, it is unlikely that any of the planned projects for the North of Scotland, which the SNP Government now propose would be able to be funded at all.
I hope that all parties will now welcome the plans and unite behind them for the good of the North of Scotland".