AROUND £100,000 is to be spent on revamping an overgrown cycle path in St Albans, it was revealed this week.

Complaints of rubbish dumping and a lack of maintenance of the Alban Way at a public meeting more than two years ago have prompted St Albans District Council to take action.

Mr Ashley Walton, of Beaumont Avenue, said that since the meeting the green route had "degenerated into a dirty, overgrown extension of the council tip."

He added: "The section backing on to Dellfields is now a dump for household rubbish and the section from Sutton Road towards Hatfield is a tiny, rutted, muddy path with room for only one cycle or person at a time.

"Complaints to the district council are met with a barrage of naive e-mails discussing how to get the people who dump their unwanted baths, fridges, TVs and washing machines to pay for their removal.

"While the e-mails go back and forth, the Alban Way festers."

However, two high-profile projects to clear waste and improve access are to due to get under way over the next few months.

An £80,000 footbridge is to be built in Camp Road by the council, environmental group Ground Work and Hertfordshire County Council. A further £20,000 will pay for landscaping around the new housing development in Sutton Road.

An enforcement notice is to be issued on an unnamed person, who is believed to be responsible for fly-tipping in the Dellfields area.

A council spokesman said the two-year delay on improvement work on Alban Way was due to the wait for planning permission for the bridge and the completion of Sutton Road housing development.

She added: "Alban Way is a high-profile project and these schemes represent major investment."

A five-year management plan has been adopted by the council to ensure the upkeep of the former railway route. It includes litter-picking every two weeks, cutting back vegetation lining the track each year and encouraging wildlife.

Mr Walton claims a tourist brochure that describes Alban Way as "a dedicated cycle path and grassy track eventually leading to St Albans, a city noted for its Roman heritage" is inaccurate.

He suggested a satirical replacement description: "Cycle and walk to the lovely Roman city of St Albans, see the forum, museum and the bath; the fridges, the washing machines and the many smashed TVs littering your path."

June 13, 2002 10:00