The final 2.5-mile stretch of the troubled tram project has been approved by the city’s transport committee but must now pass at a full council meeting on March 14 ANDREW MILLIGAN/PAEdinburgh’s troubled tram project has taken a significant step forward after councillors approved the completion of its main line more than a decade after construction began. A £207 million plan to lay the final 2.5 miles of track from York Place to Newhaven was backed by councillors from the SNP-Labour administration, against the objections of the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats on Edinburgh Council’s transport committee. A showdown at a meeting of the full council has been set for March 14 but councillors are widely expected to vote on party lines in order to complete the 11-mile long track originally known as “phase 1a”. The line was truncated when costs rose in 2011, leading to a dispute with the contractors which is now the subject of…

Source: The Times February 28, 2019 17:13 UTC