Grangemouth Ineos road closed to traffic overnight for next two weeks

Signs have been put in place on the stretch of road, between Inveravon Roundabout and Inchyra Roundabout, stating it will be closed between 8pm and 5am from Thursday, January 23 to Thursday, Feburary 6.

The closure has nothing to do with the fire which raged at company’s ground flaring facility last week or its well-known plans to permanently close the road to the public. According to Ineos the road will be closed to allow the delivery of massive pre-built modular sections of a new furnace for the firm’s ethylene plant.

Falkirk Council made the temporary prohibition of traffic order closing the A904 Bo’ness Road from its junction with A904 Grangemouth Road in a north westerly direction for approximately 1830 metres to its junction with B9143 Inchyra Road.

There will also be a nightly rolling road closures at A905 Wholeflats Road from its junction A904 Bo’ness Road in a westerly direction to its junction with B9143 Inchyra Road, as well as nightly rolling road closures on the B9143 Inchyra Road from its junction with A905 Wholeflats Road in a north easterly direction to its junction with A904 Bo’ness Road.

The alternative route is the A905 Wholeflats Road/A905 Wholeflats Roundabout/B9143 Inchyra Road and vice versa.

The stretch of Bo’ness Road saw a number of emergency services vehicles speeding down it last Thursday morning to deal with what Ineos referred to as an “operational incident”.

A blaze broke out just after 10.30am and could be seen from as far away as Bothkenner and Skinflats.

At the time an Ineos spokesperson said: “An operational incident within our ground flaring facility at the west jetty of the Grangemouth complex occurred this morning. All personnel are safe. As per normal procedure, our incident management and emergency response teams were mobilised.

“Operations have been stabilised and the emergency services have been stood down. Ineos FPS apologises for any concerns caused.”

For a number of years the road has also been the subject of a controversial planning application, which was finally given the green light in March 2019, to permanently close it off to the public and erect security gates.

Falkirk Council and Ineos are now involved in stopping up order negotiations which reportedly involve over £20 million worth of mitigation the firm will have to pay to improve the surrounding area’s traffic infrastructure so it can cope with the demands that will be placed upon it when the section of Bo’ness Road is closed.