Newark’s Southern Link Road is Urban&Civic’s single biggest infrastructure project and one that will provide benefits to the whole town and surrounding area. The scale of the project saw us undertake additional public consultation in 2023 with a community event attended by more than 400 local residents and important stakeholders to give them the opportunity to ask questions and seek information.
This year then saw a lot more work on the ground with necessary earthworks, temporary road closures, pylon removals becoming more visible to our neighbours and with that we’ve developed a more targeted approach to communicating directly with a range local communities to ensure that they are up to date with the messages that are most important to them.
This approach has involved the whole Newark team joining forces to deliver messages, visiting Parish Councils, cllr groups and officer meetings, site tours, tens of newsletters and notice boards updates for Hawton village, Riverside, Farndon, Fernwood and Balderton and the wider Newark area. All different communities requiring different messages, not just our residents in Middlebeck!
The engagement event was well organised and attended by members of the public and it proved very useful as we managed to speak to lots of residents throughout the day. It was incredible to see so many people attend the event and to even have queues at the doors! Residents relished the opportunity to speak to us face-to-face and find out more about the project which was welcomed by us.
Lynsey Preston, Planning Officer, Newark and Sherwood District Council