I'm pretty sure that's how most of the current Stromeferry to Strathcarron road was built! (Excepting the recent widenings and the blasted bit alongside the railway that's the cause of all the current problems).

That still climbs quite high; my version is a bit longer, but keeps below 250m, which should make it easier in winter:

While I'm doing fantasy A890, here's my ideas for a Strome bridge. The red option is simplest, but impinges on the view from Strome Castle (which belongs to NTS), so there's also a blue option with a chunk of causeway as well as a bridge. There's a third variant, which takes exactly the line of the ferry and existing roads.

On BBC News

The Highland Council has a Powerpoint presentation, photo gallery etc


Stromeferry Bypass Closure

Also, Plans to be drawn up to replace Stromeferry Bypass (19/01/12).

As, expected,

I'm guessing that any kind of realistic bridging option would be similar to the bridge/causeway that crosses the Kyle Of Tongue? I'm guessing the project would also see an improvement to the roads either side should they choose to build a new bridge?

Or, nearer home, the Duich causeway with bridge. I don't know Tongue very well, but I think a longer bridge than Duich would be needed, given the much greater rate of tide through Strome Narrows.


I would expect so, although I wouldn't expect full S2 the whole way - just the easy bits around Strome Carronach, probably.

That said, the cynic in me suspects that the bridge option is only included in order to publicly discount it as too expensive, and we'll just end up with a longer concrete box...

Wouldn't an avalanche shelter be best, to protect road and railway ?

Before the road was built, the railway had been operating for almost exactly a century. The railway works probably didn't involve much blasting of the rock, mostly being built up from the loch bed rather than cut into the crags. On the other hand, fitting in the road was done by cutting away the bottom of the crags (as well as moving the railway out a bit where that could be done), and it turned out that the removed sections were holding up a lot more rock than the original engineers believed.

So (IMO), the railway is much less at risk than the road, and more easily and cheaply protected.

I suppose they might be able to share the costs of an extended avalanche shelter with the railway. If they built a shelter just over the road then I would think it might increase the danger of rocks rolling over the top onto the railway line.

One thought, how do you clear any rockfalls off the top of an extended shelter?

Sorry to sound negative, but I really don't see the council spending any large amounts of money on this route. They will look at the evidence, and then go for the cheapest short-term solution.
After all, how many times has this road been closed since it opened? Have the last two severe winters exacerbated any problems with the freeze-thaw action on the cliffs? What are the chances of prolonged closures in the future?
If the road can be safely re-opened in February as reported, then presumably there is no pressing danger of rock collapsing onto moving traffic. In that case, the best I think we can hope for is additional avalanche shelters being built in the most precarious spots in the next year or two. A contingency plan will be drawn up, allowing the charter of boats (or the transfer of Maid of Glencoul) to operate a ferry service within days should the road need to be closed again in the future. Either that, or the 'level crossing' plan will be constructed as a permanent fixture, allowing traffic to be diverted onto the railway within days, for the duration of any clean up.

There is no easy road alternative, a bridge would be problematic on a number of levels, and whilst it is lovely to dream, if there was the money for any such projects, then we would have a Caol Link Road/Fort William Bypass, Corran Bridge, River Ness crossing south of Inverness and so on by now.
After all, is it really such a lifeline route when the infrastructure is in place to bypass the closure - railway and ferry slips. The A83 Rest and Be Thankful is at the other end of the scale, where the alternative route is almost as bad, and there is no alternative transport solution readily available. If any money is coming from the Government for such problems, the A83 will/should get it first.

I agree, there will be a lot of taalk about public consultations as usual but when it comes to the crunch it will be the cheapest answer that will be chosen.

Work colleagues from Inverness used to use that route mainly because the A82 down the side of Loch Ness is so poor.

Had never considered this route as an alternative to the A82 when going from Skye to Inverness until a resident of Skye recommended it to me last summer. What a pleasant surprise it was. One minute you're on a single track road the next you're on high quality S2 with long straights and sweeping bends, and barely any traffic. The local told me the police had caught someone doing 140mph on it which I could well believe when I drove it. If the remaining 10 miles or so of single track sections were widened I cant see why anyone would consider using the A82.

I almost always take the A890 between Inverness and Skye, it's a far more enjoyable drive. I'm hoping to go up at the beginning of March so hopefully the road will be open by then, if not I'll take the A86.

Why bother? Just leave the rocks there: they're not doing any harm.


The railway is more at risk than it was, because construction of the road has destablised the rock face.

If the raod and railway are to share the same space, rather than call it a level crossing can it not be reclassified as a tramway?

.

This is the first unplanned closure of the road I can remember in recent years, though it does need occasion closures for maintenance work on the rock face (drilling loose bits, bolting, replacing netting etc).
Since the road was built it has been known the rock face was unstable and it has always been a case of managing it with ongoing maintenance rather than ever expecting a permanent fix. I can't see this case being much different.

A completely new route for this section of the road was considered in the past but as it required such a distance of completely new road which would obviously have to be built in one go it was decided it was too big a spend for this route. To just improve journey times on the route it would be much more cost effective to upgrade other parts where a simpler engineering solution could be reached.



You can make decent progress between Inverness and Invermoriston providing you don't get held up by slower traffic, it just lacks overtaking opportunities. The A832-A890 route is quicker by car because you can more than make up for the slower bits on the faster bits. It's slower by lorry though as you can't go any faster than you can on the A82-A87 and the slow bits are very slow by comparison.

Well obviously, because A83 is funded by Government - A890 is Highland Council's road, so it's competing against things such as the Inverness West Link, not against Transport Scotland's roads down in Argyll.

My guess is that this would require a change in the law which would take a lot longer than using the existing laws for level crossings.

I wonder if they have considered a shotcrete (sprayed concrete) lining? Will look nasty but at least the locals will not get cut off all the time. And I suspect that any long term solution will be equally as visually intrusive.

And you could always dye the concrete to make it less visible.