City council bosses have voted to reverse their own decision on Union Terrace traffic measures in a bid to shut down any potential legal challenge from traders.
Councillors rushed to hold an emergency meeting yesterday after the local authority admitted breaking its own rules in October by voting to cut only part of its city centre roads overhaul.
In voting to make various bus gates permanent, the administration decided to scrap the ban on right turns from Union Terrace onto Rosemount Viaduct and Schoolhill, while keeping in place traffic bans on Market Street and Bridge Street. But it emerged the move was not “legally competent” under the rare roads legislation which allowed the measures to be introduced without prior consultation.
Former SNP councillor Alex Nicoll - who previously led the council - described the situation as an "absolute shambles", and the city council's chief executive, Angela Scott, apologised for the error.
Realising the error could leave the door open for city centre businesses - which have fought tooth and nail against the damaging bus gates - to mount a legal challenge, council chiefs scrambled to hold an 11th hour meeting to reverse their own decision, and opting to make the right turn ban permanent again.
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