AFTER rush hour today (January 23), New Road, Worcester, will be reduced to one lane for 10 days as part of an ongoing flood alleviation scheme.

Work to raise a 200m stretch of the major city centre road by 15 inches started on January 8, and is expected to last 18 weeks.

Severn Trent Water will be onsite for the next week and a half to move a pipe to enable the culverts – a large pipe that allows water to flow under the road – to be built as part of the scheme.

The lane remaining open will be the lane closest to the cricket ground.

The lane closures will be shorter in length than they are currently and will be back to three lanes just after the vehicle entrance to the cricket ground.

A weekend of heavy rainfall means river levels are currently higher than normal and Worcestershire County Council said this serves as a reminder of how important the works are.

Cllr Tony Miller, cabinet member with responsibility for the environment, said: “This scheme will help to keep Worcestershire moving during periods of severe flooding, allowing residents and businesses to function as normally as possible.

“The floods in 2007 and 2014 had such a huge impact on the city that we needed to review our flood alleviation strategies.

“The New Road scheme is part of our ongoing works, across the county, to reduce the impact of future flooding to residents and businesses.”

The council has said the traffic-based economic benefits of the scheme will amount to £7.5m, while the wider economic benefits would amount to more than £2.89m.

However, Worcester-based committee members Cllr Pat Agar and Paul Denham voted against the plan, with the latter claiming he was “not convinced by the economic arguments”.

He said he was also concerned by the necessity to chop down seven mature trees along the road to allow the work to happen.