A COUNTY councillor said the progress of a proposed city footbridge is “up in the air” after a decision on the plan was delayed.

The Broomhall Way footbridge was due to go before Worcestershire County Council’s planning and regulatory committee next week but has now been pushed back.

The bridge will stand over the Southern Link Road to link new housing development South Worcester Urban Extension to St Peter’s and was revealed by highways chiefs in December.

Councillor Steve Mackay, speaking at St Peter’s annual parish meeting on Thursday, said the decision has been delayed from May 14 to address certain matters including the ‘current’ flooding issues in Power Park.

Cllr Mackay said the flooding issues are actually “rife” and were pointed out some time ago by himself and other local councillors.

“It's quite a problem, it's not one that will just go away very quickly or suddenly,” he said.

Reading from a report, he said: “It says significant progress has been made towards this, and the necessary flood risk modelling has been carried out, which is a necessary precursor to identifying suitable mitigating measures.”

The county and city councillor said, “reading between the lines”, the flood risk modelling the project team have done to date has got to be completely reassessed before work begins on foundations.

“They have got photographs of it, [Cllr] Roger [Knight], you've supplied those to them in the past. They know what the problem is now, I don't think they realised quite as big of a problem as it is. I don't want to use the word sink in.”

Cllr Mackay said the project team is also working on ways to “satisfy concerns” regarding the appearance of the bridge from Malvern Hills and Wychavon district councils.

“That is something that was apparently all done and dusted but has raised its head again because I think in the first instance Malvern Hills [District Council] raised it and then there were further concerns by Wychavon [District Council].”

A county council spokesman said: "All of these matters are being progressed but could not be addressed in sufficient detail in time to meet the deadline for the Planning and Regulatory Committee.

"We are confident that they will be finalised in the near future and the proposal can then be considered.”

Duncan Rudge, development control manager for MHDC, said, along with Wychavon, Malvern has "been asked to respond as consultees". As such, we have raised concerns that "the proposed design of the bridge is not of sufficient design quality."

"However, we continue to work positively with the applicant and have made suggestions of the type of bridge design we would like to see.”

The bridge is being funded by the Urban Extension developers but delivered by the county council.

It was originally expected to be completed in early 2020.