CALLS to ease congestion near a busy construction site have been raised by Llangollen residents who fear an accident is waiting to happen.

Work to build 91 homes on Vicarage Road began on April 27, but concerned residents have questioned why the company, SG Estates, was allowed to continue to build more houses prior to completing the access road as promised.

One disgruntled resident, who wished to remain anonymous, expressed her frustration towards the company, who she states “have not kept to their contract” as the access road should have been completed more than 22 weeks ago.

She said: “I’ve been a resident here for 26 years and the difficulties I’ve experienced since work began is ridiculous.

“I’m not opposed to the 91 houses being built but I am to the health and safety issues it’s causing to not only myself, but to my family and other residents too.

“We were promised the access road for the new houses would be completed before further construction work took place, as this was a way of easing the traffic flow and more importantly reducing the risks of accidents.”

The time period to build the 91 new houses is set to take three-and-a-half years, which the long-term resident is dreading.

She added: “It’s already having an impact on my day to day life.

“I’ve been forced to move my car to make way for trucks to get past, there has been damage to my wing mirror because of how narrow the road is and there not being room for the big vehicles to get passed.

“The on-going noise of drilling is a constant nightmare, especially when it happens over the weekend.

“The appearance of the road is appalling, as there’s mud everywhere.

“I’m afraid that someone is going to get hurt due to the vehicles being big and the road so narrow, small children like my grandchildren.”

Another nearby resident, Paul Owens, who uses the road to gain access to a nearby field to walk his dog, said: “It’s absolutely ridiculous.

“I walk my dog around the area on a daily basis and the noise is just awful.

“The road is narrow as it is, and without the access road being completed it has caused a lot of traffic issues.”

A spokesman for SG Estates, said: “Just prior to commencement of the roadworks on Hall Street and Willow Street, we were approached by Hafren Dyfrdwy (HD) regarding the construction of a new reservoir off Vicarage Road, to the rear (South) of the property known as Fron Hyfryd.

“HD told us of its need to install a main from the A5 to its site and requested they be allowed to lay the pipe whilst we undertook our works on Hall Street and Willow Street.

“We discussed the matter with Denbighshire County Council Highways Department, as the option of us completing the improvements, only to have HD digging through a brand new road shortly afterwards to install a 315mm diameter main was not at all desirable.

“Indeed, it would have infuriated the local community due to what would be perceived as a lack of ‘joined-up-thinking’ by all parties.

“We decided it was in the public interest to accommodate HD’s pipe laying within our works programme thereby minimising disruption in the locality (traffic/noise/access) and avoiding further road closures in the vicinity at a later date - not to mention the additional traffic and muddy roads so soon after we had completed our work.

“However, our decision to assist with the reservoir project has come at a price.

“We have experienced a significant delay to its progress as a result of accommodating these ‘unrelated’ works, and our programme has been delayed as a result of it.

“Without this incurred delay the majority of the roadworks to feed the development site would have been completed by now.

“We are a small local family-owned development company and our financial resources are not as endless as some of the large national companies and the resultant delay would have had a serious impact on the viability of our company proceeding with the development.

“We have had to commence works on some of the properties on phase 1 of the development out-of-sequence and prior to the roads being completed.

“This action has been required in order to meet our financial responsibilities and deliver the required housing to the market in a timeous manner.

“This site has been identified by Denbighshire County Council as being vital to meet the shortfall in available local housing and we has invested heavily in delivering this vision.

“Accordingly, we are committed to delivering the project and infrastructure as soon as possible and without further delays.

“Works continue to progress on-site, and it is anticipated that the roads shall be [surfaced] to base course in approximately six weeks’ time.

“We have already spent almost £2 million on reconstructing and upgrading the local highway, utility and infrastructure to date, underlining our commitment to Llangollen.

“In addition we have sponsored several local events and organisations including (Llanfest/Bikefest/Christmas lights/football team etc.

“We are committed to helping the local community as best we can.

“We are keen to get the roads completed as this delay is causing frustration for everyone, not least ourselves.

“The biggest issue that we are facing is that we can only lay a road when everything required beneath it has been laid.

“We continue to push our contractors and the utility companies to expedite the works and enable the surface to be laid as soon as possible to address and alleviate local traffic issues.

“We are calling on relationships with the other utilities’ personnel to try to keep works on track, and they are trying to help out, so hopefully the impact of events this week can be mitigated as soon as possible.

“The traffic issue on Hill Street is also being impacted as a result of plant and materials being delivered to HD.

“We apologise to the local neighbour who has experienced inconvenience and we will ensure we expedite our final works to the highway upgrades and ensure all our resources target a timeous completion date.”

A spokesman for Denbighshire Council, said: “The developer has submitted a request to the council to change the requirement of when the highway works are to be completed.

“The council is legally required to assess this request before taking any further action.”