PROMOTERS of a controversial east bank link road for Ipswich today insisted their plans could go ahead despite council rejection of the scheme.Suffolk County Council left the road off its "wish list" of projects for the next ten years because it felt the £67 million cost could not be justified.

PROMOTERS of a controversial east bank link road for Ipswich today insisted their plans could go ahead despite council rejection of the scheme.

Suffolk County Council left the road off its "wish list" of projects for the next ten years because it felt the £67 million cost could not be justified.

However Clive Thompson of developers Samuel Beadie who have offered to build the road as part of a major redevelopment of south east Ipswich, insisted this figure was well wide of the mark.

He said: "We have done detailed costings over many years, and we cannot understand where these figures come from.

"Our estimate for this new road is no more than £20 million, with a further £4 million spent on environmental improvements.

"We don't know where they got their figure from – they have built in about £17 million for 'contingencies' and they have considered the cost of buying the land, but their estimate is very very high."

Mr Thompson said Samuel Beadie already owned much of the land the road would be built over and had agreements with the owners of other land to take it in return for developing a redundant area overlooking the River Orwell.

The developers want to build a new retail park on the site of the former Volvo depot – but that is out of the question without better road access.

"The cost of buying the land is not an issue as far as we are concerned because we already own most of it," Mr Thompson said.

Protesters have campaigned for more than 15 years against proposals for a new east bank road, fearing it would damage Piper's Vale.

However Mr Thompson insisted the road would be good for the local economy – and its impact on the environment would not be severe.

He said: "We have carried out and sponsored many studies into the proposed road and we would go to great lengths to ensure there were no major environmental problems.

"And so far as the development as a whole is concerned, it would create at least 1,000 permanent jobs for people in one of the most deprived areas of Ipswich."

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