£1m park and ride to link tourist Ironbridge with Much Wenlock

A park and ride scheme costing almost £1 million is being created in Ironbridge, it was announced today.

The service will link the town with Much Wenlock in readiness for an influx of tourists for the 2012 Olympic Games, organisers said. The £980,000 scheme will see 250 parking spaces created close to the county's World Heritage Site on Stoney Hill, Jiggers Bank.

And there will be a shuttle bus operating every 12 minutes into the heart of the Ironbridge Gorge.

There will also be an hourly service to Much Wenlock, which is expecting 50,000 tourists alone during the August Olympic Games because of its historic links to the sporting event.

Once in Ironbridge, tourists and residents of the county will be able to get on the Gorge Connect bus which will take them around the World Heritage Site.

The service will be open to the public from June until the end of the busy tourist season in October.

Councillor Hilda Rhodes, cabinet member for transport and community protection at Telford & Wrekin Council, said the location for the park and ride would provide excellent connections from the local road network, including the M54.

She said: "This is really good news for tourism and sustainable transport in the borough, especially Ironbridge Gorge and the surrounding area.

The park and ride site is in an excellent location, close to the Gorge, but with very good road network links, and I'm pleased that work is now under way so that the park and ride will be up and running in time for what will be an extremely busy summer in the borough."

Steve Miller, chief executive of Ironbridge Gorge Museums, said the new service will encourage more people to travel into and around the famous site creating 250 much-needed new parking spaces.

Gorge Connect services will begin to operate from April.