Road works update for week starting 31 October

A summing up of road works in the county underway or soon to start:

News flash as at 2 November: The B9052 (at Graemeshall) will be closed from Thursday 3 November, from Churchill Barrier No. 1 to the Holm war memorial, for the remainder of this week (up to and including 4 November) to enable the Council to carry out emergency works on the sea wall to reinstate blocks that have moved in recent bad weather. School transport and public bus services will be unaffected.

Work at the junction of Lynn Road and Deerness Road (A960) in Kirkwall starts on 31 October 2022 and is expected to be completed by end of the day on Thursday (3 Nov). Traffic will be controlled by temporary traffic signals on Deerness Road and road closures on Lynn Road and Makenzies Drive. There may be delays on the No 4 airport bus and No 3 Deerness bus.

Work is programmed start on 3 November 2022 on the A961 between Heathery Loan and Highland Park, it is hoped that the work in this area will only take a couple of days to complete with traffic being controlled by temporary traffic signals for the duration of the work. There may be slight delays to the X1 public bus service and school buses. Update as at 2 November: These works are now not expected to start until 7 November.

Work is ongoing to the north of Norseman Village on the main A966 road to Tingwall. Temporary traffic lights are in place and drivers should allow for short delays.

Emergency works are ongoing on the Harray Road (A986) at Harray to fix a collapsed culvert which has been causing flooding on the road between Grimeston Road and Refuge Corner. At the moment, crews are off site but there is steel-plating in place over the road until the crews return to finish the culvert replacement, at which point temporary traffic lights will be reinstated. Drivers are asked to heed any speed signs for the safety of workers exposed to traffic. There will be slight delays for public bus Service 7 (Birsay-Dounby).

Work by Scottish Water is ongoing on Glaitness Road, Kirkwall, with temporary traffic lights in place.

Road works and road closures are ongoing on the B9055 Brodgar Road and are expected to continue for a further three to four weeks, carried out in four phases. Please note below revised schedule and completion dates. Signed diversion routes will be in place for duration via Harray and Dounby (the A986) or A967 Sandwick Road, and at times via the Lyking Road. These are relatively lengthy diversions so drivers should allow extra time for their journeys. The works will impact on public bus Service 8 (Quoyloo service) - buses will not serve Brodgar Road and will follow the signed diversions.

The works will be carried out in four stages – please note the dates are indicative and subject to weather and resourcing:

• Phase 1 Layby at Standing Stones of Stenness to Ring of Brodgar car park  - 20 October to 4 November
• Phase 2 Ring of Brodgar car park to access to Buckan Cottage - 7 to 10 November
• Phase 3 Buckan to Lyking Road – 7 to 14 November
• Phase 4  Lyking Road to A967 -  15 to 18 November

Looking further ahead:

Drainage survey work is planned to start on 14 November 2022 on Junction Road, Great Western Road and West Tankerness Lane, with the bulk of the work being carried out under road closure conditions  with road closures being likely to be in place during the day all week , signed diversion routes via Great Western Road will be in place as and when roads are closed. Motorists are encouraged to follow the signed diversion routes as they will likely provide better traffic flow than alternative ‘shortcuts’.

Work is planned to take place on the Yesnaby Road on 18 to 22 November, with the road being closed whilst work is being carried out on site. Delays to affected properties will be minimised when possible.

Openreach are planning to carry out work on Yinstay Road from 21 November with a current completion date of 21 January 2023. Further information on access during the work will hopefully be available shortly.

Resurfacing works on the Holm Road/Easdale loan junction is planned to start on 23 November, for around four days. (These are works rescheduled from October to allow Openreach to repair a manhole in the vicinity.) This will see Easdale Loan being closed to through traffic and temporary traffic lights in place. The No 9 Town service will experience minor delays, and there will be a short diversion for the No 4 Airport bus, but passengers will be able to pick the bus up at both the top or the bottom of Easdale loan.

Work is planned to start on the A964 between Scorradale Road and Gyre Road (in vicinity of Nealand Kennels)  on 28 November. It is likely the work will need to be carried out under road closure conditions, but this has yet to be confirmed. Further details including impacts on school transport and/or public buses (Service 2 – Houton) will follow.