Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Revamp on seafront will ‘need time to settle in’
CONTROVERSIAL changes to Clevedon seafront need time to “bed in” before any amendments are made, experts have said.
North Somerset Council appointed Audit West to carry out a review of the scheme which has seen major changes to the seafront and Hill Road.
Auditors have now recommended that a “period of time” should be allowed for the scheme to “bed in” before any changes are considered.
In its report Audit West said: “It is the auditor’s overall recommendation that a period of time should be allowed for the scheme to ‘bed in’ and for the technical reviews to be completed before any retrospective changes to the scheme are considered.”
The investigation also looked at the costs of the scheme. The project was originally budgeted to cost £220,520 which has spiralled to an estimated £1.5 million.
Auditors said the project was ‘poorly estimated’ with “over-ambitious initial budget costings” but also attributed the increasing bill to inflation, the Covid pandemic, Brexit and the war in Ukraine.
Audit West said: “This internal audit review has identified a large deviation in spend from that anticipated within the original scheme design, and therefore it’s vital that any further spending is well considered and in view of all available information to ensure that future value for money for the public is achieved.”
The audit also said the initial consultation on the plans was short and potentially did not reach all residents in Clevedon.
It said: “The North Somerset Council public consultation period was short (5 Feb - 7 Mar 2021) and took place during a national lockdown, so was primarily limited to being an online exercise and as such potentially did not reach all demographics.
“The consultation was based around a design that the council had already drawn up and thus residents may not have felt fully engaged or believed that they had only limited influence.”
Auditors also said the project was affected by changes in key roles during the work.
They said: “The project suffered from a lack of stability in management, having had changes in key roles during the project.
“The council has put in place revised and robust project management, risk management and capital governance arrangements over the last 12-18 months to provide greater oversight over such schemes.
“However, the Clevedon scheme originally predated these enhanced arrangements and, specifically in respect of capital governance, the project costs that were estimated at the outset would have meant that this scheme would not have been considered a ‘major project’ and therefore not subject to enhanced monitoring.”
The findings of the report come at the same time as North Somerset Council has appointed independent consultants to conduct an overall review of the scheme, the results of which are expected later this autumn.
The seafront scheme, which has seen The Beach and Hill Road made one way, parking realigned along the prom and a new segregated cycle lane installed, has proved hugely unpopular with residents and business.
A petition calling for its reversal has collected more than 6,000 signatures.