Glasgow airport rail link claims 'misleading'

08/10/2009

By James Wilson

Claims that the scrapped Glasgow airport rail link had become unaffordable have been disputed by the local council.

Glasgow city council leader Steven Purcell has suggested that ministers in the Scottish government had inflated the cost of creating the rail link and argued suggestions costs had spiralled by £70 million were wide of the mark.

Speaking to Holyrood's transport committee, the BBC says Mr Purcell denied that there had been such an escalation in price.

"The figure of increase would appear to be £2.5 million and not the £70 million that was quoted in my telephone conversation with the transport minister," the news provider reports him as saying.

His comments could mean the Scottish government may want to look again at the viability of the Glasgow airport rail link, which was scraped by ministers as part of a number of measures designed to cut expenditure.

While work on the main line between Glasgow and Paisley is continuing, it was announced in September that the branch line creating a new link with Glasgow airport would not go ahead.