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Shetland Islands Council Loses Battle to Stop Dredging
27 Jan 2008
The Shetland Islands Council (SIC) is being asked to pay more than £5m towards the cost of dredging work at Port of Lerwick, having lost a legal battle to prevent the work going ahead.
Dredging will allow Port of Lerwick to bid for more decommissioning work.
At the end of last year, Lerwick Port Authority awarded a contract to Westminster Dredging Company to dredge almost 500,000 m3 of material from the harbour.
The £12m project will widen and deepen the port’s north entrance from 6m to 9m, allowing larger vessels to use the port and attract more North Sea decommissioning work.
The dredging work was stopped a few days before it was due to start in August 2005 when the SIC petitioned the Edinburgh Court of Session, saying the work would jeopardise plans for a bridge across the harbour to the isle of Bressay. The petition was refused in January 2007 and as a result the council is being asked to pay more than £5.25m towards the new dredging contract, which is around £6 million more expensive than the 2005 contract that was awarded to Belgian contractor Jan de Nul.
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