Contractors working on the £4 million Methil active travel scheme walked off on Thursday, as around a dozen people began a day-long protest.
Traffic was halted when protesters holding placards positioned a skeleton on a chair in the road to illustrate their concerns about the impact on local businesses.
They say the demonstrations will continue until officials agree to reinstate the removed roundabout.
Police briefly cleared barriers to allow vehicles through, but the protest resumed once contractors returned to work.
Protesters blocked the road and set out traffic cones in front of vehicles. To keep warm, they lit a fire in a metal barrel, which led to a visit from the fire service and a warning about black smoke drifting across the carriageway and creating a hazard for drivers.
The demonstrations began five weeks ago, shortly after work on the active travel scheme started, with what residents say was short notice.
The scheme, which aims to encourage more people to walk, wheel, or cycle rather than using a car, involves widening footpaths and creating a segregated cycleway and footpath.
The cycle and pedestrian path will eventually run the length of Methilhaven Road and Sea Road. The roundabout is also getting replaced by traffic lights.
The protest was called at a public meeting on Wednesday night, as the temporary traffic lights are causing traffic and businesses are losing trade as customers avoid the area.
They fear the situation will continue indefinitely if the traffic lights become permanent.
Graeme Dignan of Toll Auto Services told The Courier: “If they tell us putting it back will take x amount of time, we’ll have to suck it up.
“But at least it will be better for us in the long run. If they say they’re carrying on with the traffic lights, we’ll continue to protest.”
Councillors Tom Adams and Ken Caldwell now agree the roundabout should be rebuilt. They will push for a special meeting of the Levenmouth area committee to discuss the issue in full.
Andrew Latto from Parker’s Auction House declared: “If you won’t answer our question now, you will find out what the people of Methil can achieve without councillors.
“Once we have achieved it, you will have to stand down because that’s what the people will demand. It’s an absolute shambles for a cycle lane nobody wants.
“We have to cause disruption to be heard properly because they’re not representing us properly. We have to take it into our own hands.”
Mr Adams said in response: “I absolutely understand the level of anger that we’re actually making progress.
“Council officers will now take that back and convey that level of anger.
“There are some questions we couldn’t answer tonight because some are technical, but we’ll hopefully get the answers people are looking for.”
Fife Council transportation manager Mark Dewar said traffic lights are safer than roundabouts for pedestrians and cyclists.
“It is our intention to complete the signalisation part first, by the end of November or early December,” he said.
Replacing the roundabout would take until after Christmas to complete.
Plans for Methil’s active travel scheme were approved by councillors in 2024, following the award of Levelling-Up fund cash from the previous UK Government. The money has to either be spent by February or returned to the government.
16 thoughts on “Contractors walk off from £4m active travel scheme after protesters brand project “an absolute shambles””
Ive not been to Methil for
Ive not been to Methil for years, but I can’t imagine much passing trade to be disrupted
HLaB wrote:
They’ll be out in the day protesting and then going back home and doing their shopping online.
I can only assume the
I can only assume the protestors who stopped traffic will get the same treatment as the Just Stop Oil protestors and the right wing rags will be up in arms.
Oopsie just realised it’s in Scotland… Am sure their protest laws are less strict.
Not that much less.
Not that much less. Guaranteed if they’d been holding up Just Stop Oil signs and obstructing the highway *at a minimum* they would have been moved off to the side and arressted if they refused. Nevermind that threatening people – which is the only valid reason for the contractors walking off the job, and if they did it for another reason they should be barred from public works jobs permanently – should have been an automatic Breach of the Peace detention.
Of course the reality is these are “worthy” protestors, people with “legitimate concerns” and “great depth of feeling”, not like those smelly treehuggers, so the polis will do eff-all.
Well, building is disruptive.
Well, building is disruptive. And roundabouts may be safer (for a given capacity) for motorists. And out there in Fife probably it’s almost all tourists and kids cycling…
But the idea that converting a roundabout into traffic lights is going to kill your town – in a small place with a parallel road 500m away, and effectively a bypass if you’re really in a hurry… ?
As Chris Boardman notes – for effective take-up of change we should offer *options*. And one of those is always the choice to do nothing. BUT that can’t come with a guarantee that we’ll just things for people so they don’t bear the consequences. Which should be be “you’ll now have to find the cash from your other budgets to fix the potholes, deal with growing congestion, the injuries and deaths from collisions and the health consequences of sedentary lifestyles…”
Last time I cycled in the
Last time I cycled in the area the suggested routes all bypased the towns on the coast completely, (suggesting a shared path along an A road just above this) and routes through towns up the hill aeay ftom the coast. You’d think with the relatively new train station at Leven they’d see the utility in at least some active travel route near it.
Niot a single one of their
Niot a single one of their placards says “Methil no more”. F***ing amateurs.
Those protesters look like
Those protesters look like they do about 100ml a wk, 60kg whet thru – why are protesters getting more forwards nowadays, like I can understand some matters – but this, come on!
Let’s call A spade a spade.
Let’s call a spade a spade. ‘A cycle path nobody wants’ tells you everything you need to know about these Yokles. They are a bunch of knuckle-dragging bullies who have intimidated contractors trying to do their jobs to earn money for their families. The fact is, if a ‘cycle path’ was not part of this road improvement then there would have been no protests. These people are political ideologues, the Police should crack down on them hard. Road safety considerations should decide what happens in Methil not intimidating anti-cycle bullies who think bikes get in the way of them driving dangerously fast around residential streets.
stevemaiden wrote:
Steady on, that’s culture-war talk! Also … it being in Police Scotland’s patch it is very unlikely that any aggrieved motorists have anything to fear.
How much cheap beer were
How much cheap beer were those two cretins offered to stand out there with their cardboard signs?
Blackthorne wrote:
I like “Local businesses bled to the bone” – one can be stripped to the bone or bled dry but never heard of being bled to the bone before.
Some kind of ghoulish vampire
Some kind of ghoulish vampire lollipop?
There are already two set of
There are already two set of traffic lights at the roundabout for pedestrian crossing points.
I earnestly hope the council
I earnestly hope the council endorses the original plans. Anything that includes provision for cycling and walking will result in apoplexy in people like these
Pretty much guaranteed that
Pretty much guaranteed that if contractors walked off site, someone provably threatened and/or abused them.
At which point roadworks are then permanent because if it isn’t safe to work on them because of threats from public then they will be left in limbo.