April - but not fooled....

Regular viewers of this journal will know that one day last autumn we had a deluge of rain  (108 mm , of which 25 mm fell in less than an hour in the morning) 

Amongst other things that were damaged beyond repair was  this  bridge at Bailemore at the top end of Loch Striven , a bridge which carries our direct road to Dunoon.   If you look closely you can see that the deck has moved and some of the side masonry too.   It cannot be repaired and a new bridge will have to be built to replace it. 

Argyll & Bute Council were reasonably speedy in getting a Bailey bridge replacement in situ and that opened at the beginning of December,  admittedly delayed from the original promised date , but all in all not a bad achievement which meant that we only had to thole two months of a very long detour.

At the time the communities affected - which include the Island of Bute, as there is a great deal of daily traffic via the Rhudbodach / Colintravie ferry - were  also assured  by the Council that a new bridge would be put in place "by" April.  A few weeks later that changed to "in" April, but the month still stuck.  

Now however , as April arrives, the word is that it will take a long process of consultation, design  and  general bureaucratic hoop jumping before the job can even be started with dire mutterings that there can be "no time set" for it to be finished  , whilst officials also contend that the temporary bridge is doing "just fine".

So on this April Fools Day , driving to Dunoon, it occurred to me that the joke has really been on all those who, like me,  believed the promise made under pressure last autumn.  Which is a pity, because it tarnishes the good job the council did in getting emergency arrangements in place here and in a number of other places so badly hit on the 7th of October 2023.