Infrastructure woes on Arran

Sir, So the long-awaited £30m ferry terminal doesn’t work properly. No surprises there then. I along with many others had to embark and disembark via the car ramp last week as we’ve had to before the big investment. A nice introduction to the visitors, who contribute to the local economy, so that they can have their fillings rattled and tyres and suspensions blown by the island’s terrible roads. And as for the cyclists they might be lucky enough to get away with a few cuts and bruises as they get pitched into a pothole.

But wait! There is news of the council’s £1m proposed investment in the roads. £1m sounds like a lot but it won’t go very far at today’s prices. Maybe part of the investment will go to supplying a few more team members with shovels and buckets of filler which will get washed away in the first rain. Or maybe we’ll be lucky and some proper heavy machinery with skilled operators will arrive. Or maybe not.

The very large hole in the road at Whiting Bay is a good example of ‘let’s ignore problems and they may go away’. Over two years ago I reported the potential future problems in store by not attending to obvious erosion of the sandstone wall on which the new sea wall had been seated. The council office reply was ‘we are aware of the situation’. Obviously they weren’t.

Arran is a beautiful island visited by visitors from all over the world It has some wonderful tourist attractions. Rotten roads and the absence of public toilets are not two of them. On the latter point, I find it surprising that a house located close to a sewage pipe running underneath a public road still has to use a septic tank.

Arran isn’t part of the Third World – come on, let us embrace the 21st century. Still it’s comforting to know that the council taxes are being put to good use – for something or other.

Disillusioned and disappointed.

Yours, David Roberts Whiting Bay