A new consultation into the future of Shildon’s Millennium Arches is due to go ahead in October.
Durham County Council (DCC) will host a consultation event at Shildon Civic Hall on Tuesday 4th October from 10am until 8pm, when four options will be presented to the public.
The consultation can also be accessed online for anyone unable to drop in to the Civic Hall event and will remain available online at www.durham.gov.uk/consultation until Monday 24th October.
The options available include retaining all four arches; removing the arch sections while keeping the columns; demolishing two arches or demolishing all three arches.
A spokesperson for the Save our Arches campaign said: “From our point of view there is only one option: to keep all three of Shildon’s Millennium arches.
“The arches were erected at great public expense just 16 years ago and are made of a material that will last a lifetime if looked after.
“Durham County Council has already admitted that it has failed to maintain them at all since they came into being.
“Is it any wonder that they are deteriorating? The responsibility for their condition falls squarely with DCC and the people of Shildon should not be the ones to suffer from the county’s negligence in failing to maintain them.”
Agreeing with the campaigners, local councillor Gary Huntington added: “Durham County Council had a duty of care to maintain the arches and I would appeal to the public to choose to retain all three arches.
“The County are attempting to frighten people by claiming it will cost £211,449 to maintain the arches.
“This is simply not the case. Their own report says that to put right the mess they created will cost DCC £85,510. The remaining £135,000 is what DCC need to re-paint the arches in 20 years’ time.
“For DCC to claim that this money can be better spent elsewhere during times of austerity is incredible when most of the money isn’t needed for 20 years. Are they saying we will still be suffering austerity in 20 years?”
“In fact, all Durham County Council, which operates an annual budget of over £1.2bn, needs to do is put aside £6,800 a year and it will have saved all the funds it needs to repair the arches in 20 years’ time.”
Asked for a breakdown of the costs, Sarah Robson, head of economic development and housing, said: “To allow a consultation to be carried out with accurate costings, a single quote was requested.
“However this was done via a company which has already been through a tendering process to be placed on the North East Procurement Organisation (NEPO) framework and is the first placed contractor for both painting and scaffolding for the council.
“This is standard practice for consultation exercises to allow costings to be included for projects which may or may not go ahead, as is the case with Shildon Arches, depending on what the public tell us they want to happen.
“If the decision is made to keep the arches then a competitive tendering exercise will be carried out for a final quote although we don’t expect these to be very different from the costs used in the consultation.
“The officers who have prepared the costings for the consultation will be attending the event at Shildon Civic Hall on 4th October and we’d encourage anyone with questions about the process to come along and speak to them.”
Shildon & District's local community newspaper.
