Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser
Motorists facing two months of roads restrictions
Roadworks and speed restrictions will be in place for the next two months on the stretch of the M8 between Chapelhall and Salsburgh, while repairs are carried out at an adjoining bridge.
The “essential structural maintenance” by Transport Scotland is scheduled to run for eight weeks from 8pm tomorrow until April 24 and will include nine overnight closures during the work.
It will see £ 159,000 of work carried out at Longacre Bridge – located between junctions five and six – to repair joints and deck concrete, and to rewaterproof and resurface the bridge deck.
The motorway will be closed from 8pm to 6am both tomorrow and Friday, and again for the same period of 10 hours on March 17 and 27 and April 2, 13, and the overnights beginning at 8pm on April 21 to 23.
Drivers will be diverted through Salsburgh during the night- time closures, which are needed to adjust contraflow set-ups and traffic management between each of the project’s five phases.
Westbound traffic will leave the M8 at junction 6A on those occasions to join the A8 and A73, travelling on the B7066 through Salsburgh and rejoining the motorway at the Harthill/ Shotts junction; while vehicles coming from the Edinburgh direction will have the same route reversed.
Drivers using the M8 throughout the two-month project will have a speed limit of 40mph and two live lanes of traffic will run in each direction.
Roads officials say the work will “improve the condition of the carriageway and reduce the need for more extensive repairs in the future”, adding: “It will benefit around 27,156 vehicles using this route each day.”
They added: “This scheme has been planned in consultation with Transport Scotland, Traffic Scotland, the emergency services and North Lanarkshire Council.”