A MULTI-MILLION pound road scheme to open up Oswestry’s new innovation park is just weeks away from being unveiled.

Shropshire Council is currently putting together a design that will create a suitable access point to the 60-acre site off Mile End roundabout on the A5/A483.

It will then go to Highways England to utilise part of a £9 million government grant which was pledged at the end of last year for a series of road improvements in the area.

Councillor Peter Nutting, leader of Shropshire Council, said he expected to discover the outcome in the next few weeks.

He said: “We are hoping we will have some answers in the next three or four months. “This is a live discussion that is going on as we speak and has progressed quite a long way.”

The site was initially opened by Highways England when they spent £4 million redesigning the roundabout in 2014.

But Cllr Nutting said the exit it is not suitable. He added: “I appreciate they [Highways England] have spent money – I’m not sure they really did the job properly and we have got some ideas that we think will do the job properly.

“It’s very early days. We are quite confident that if we could get the access it could be a major site.”

But Cllr Nutting also said it could be years before employers come onto the site.

He continued: “It’s no good going out to sell it unless we are sure we can do it. “By the time we do the traffic scheme, sort out the electricity and the access, it will be two or three years away before someone is actually going to sit in an office and do some work there.”

Cllr Nutting also revealed that the council is looking at how to develop the corner of land off Shrewsbury Road.

The land is the final section of the sustainable urban extension after the majority was subject to planning permissions for 750 homes.

He added: “We have got to think whether it is used for housing or again, whether there are some commercial opportunities.

“It is very ripe; it is right on the major island, by a major innovation park, so we may have to think differently. “We can think about that as we go forward over the next year or so.”