Active Annandale - Annan Town Centre and Village links
During 2018 and 2019 public consultations were held in the Annan area to find out what the local community felt about their town centre. One of the themes to emerge was about how to get around the area and active travel.
Getting Annan Active
As result of these consultations, Dumfries and Galloway Council submitted applications to Places for Everyone, an active travel infrastructure programme funded by the Scottish Government and administered by Sustrans Scotland.
Our council was successful in securing funding in March 2023 through Sustrans Places for Everyone fund. This has enabled us to explore how active travel can be incorporated into Annan town centre and how Gretna, Eastriggs, Annan and Powfoot can be linked to encourage more people to walk, wheel and cycle in Annandale.
The aim for Annan town centre is to encourage more people to walk, wheel and cycle for their everyday journeys, making car parking less dominant and more effective. The priorities include creating a walking, wheeling and cycling network and the improvement of the high street pedestrian experience.
The Village Links project will link Annan, Eastriggs, Gretna and Powfoot through connecting existing cycle paths. There are also several core paths in the area which are used for walking, wheeling and cycling. Travel for everyday journeys can be made safer by connecting these core paths with new paths and upgrading some of the existing paths.
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Plan of Work Concept (Stages 0-2) is about broadly defining the scope of a project and its desired outcomes. Partners involved in the process carry out initial engagement with stakeholders and outline the total expected costs. This stage is now complete for both Annan Town Centre and Village Links.
Annan Town Centre
An application has been submitted to Sustrans for Stages 3 and 4 for funding to develop the design for one route identified in the concept design, which was Route G for Annan Town Centre. This was identified as one of the routes that received the strongest support at the community engagement session on 12 March 2024.
Map Showing Route G
View Route G map in more detail [PDF - 441KB]
Stage 2 Public Event Session Two Feedback
9.1 Route Option Referendum
During the third public event (stage 2 session two) held during March 2024, the community was updated on the details of the concept routes, noting the decision by Dumfries and Galloway Council to remove the High Street - Option A - from the network plan.
During the event, each of the proposed route plans were subject to evaluation. The feedback will be used to assist in the development of the schemes.
To support a better understanding of the public's support for each of the route options, Dumfries and Galloway Council asked a referendum type question for each route to understand if the route is supported, would be supported with change or should be discarded.
A summary of the referendum response to each route is provided in the following table.
| Total Votes | Supportive | Supported but Requires Change | Not Supported | |||
Number | (%) | Number | (%) | Number | (%) | ||
Route B | 112 | 93 | 83 | 5 | 4 | 14 | 13 |
Route C | 115 | 3 | 25 | 25 | 22 | 87 | 76 |
Route E | 96 | 8 | 8 | 23 | 24 | 65 | 78 |
Route F | 104 | 11 | 11 | 28 | 27 | 65 | 63 |
Route G | 122 | 83 | 68 | 11 | 9 | 28 | 23 |
Route I | 117 | 11 | 9 | 38 | 32 | 68 | 58 |
Total | 666 | 209 |
| 130 |
| 327 |
|
The results of the question indicate that only route options B and G received strong community support with Option I offering the most potential for change and possible support in the future.
9.2 Post Engagement Harbour to High Street Petition
Following the public event, the design team received several documents containing the signature of residents supportive of the partial reinstatements of route option A - Harbour to High Street. The section of the route being supported being the harbour to High Street and connection to wider network.
In total of 152 signatures were collected within a short period of time with an additional 148 available on request. These results show that some residents believe that the Welldale/Port Street scheme extending to the Harbour area should be reinstated and connected to the proposed network.
Active Annandale Village Links
An application for Stages 3 and 4 has also been submitted for the Village Links routes. The Design (Stages 3-4) involves carrying out developed and technical tasks to make a project workable. Partners use funding at these stages to clearly define their interventions, test implementations and undertake significant community engagement.
It is anticipated that a decision on funding will be made by Sustrans this year.
For further information, please contact: ActiveAnnandale@dumgal.gov.uk.
