Published on 20 December 2022
Work on the new roundabout on the A6 at Fairfield Common is almost complete and the traffic lights and site compound will be removed before Christmas.
High Peak Borough Council secured funding from Homes England's Housing Infrastructure Fund to build the roundabout at the southern end of the golf course to provide access to housing sites at Hogshaw and Waterswallows (Dale Lane).
Further funding of £1.5m has since been secured from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, supporting the development of regional devolution proposals, meaning the project has been delivered entirely by the Council obtaining external grant funding.
Now that the main construction is complete, subject to the weather, ecology works to enhance the biodiversity of the area will be taking place including:
- Leaving a strip of exposed stone on the east facing embankments
- Recycling the removed tree stumps to create a semi-buried stumpery with semi-buried pockets of stump grindings and concrete rubble on the western side of the roundabout
- Planting oak saplings in the stumpery
- Retaining an existing low wet area to provide seasonally wet grassland on the western side of the roundabout
- Overseeding the areas disturbed by construction activities with a wildflower seed mix
These measures will provide habitats with different features to attract invertebrates. You can view a plan of the layout on the Council's website at www.highpeak.gov.uk/FairfieldCommonRoundabout
Council Leader, Councillor Anthony Mckeown, said: "I'd like to thank everyone for their patience and understanding whilst these works have been taking place. The onsite team have worked hard to complete this project as quickly as possible and I'm pleased that it is more or less finished before the end of the year.
"The final phase of the works are the various ecology enhancements that will be put in place - an aspect of the project that I'm sure people will welcome.
"We are also going to work with the Buxton-Oignies twinning association on naming the roundabout after our twin town in France to replicate the Buxton-named roundabout in Oignies and highlight the strong and long standing relationship between our two communities."
Some offline works to the roundabout will be required early in the new year and people are encouraged to check the website and the Council's Facebook and Twitter accounts for details of any traffic management required.
