A LONG-awaited extension to an Oxford Park and Ride has officially been completed and opened.

The Seacourt Park and Ride extension, with 595 extra parking spaces, has been finished after years of setbacks and spiralling costs.

A bus shelter attached to the Park and Ride was officially opened on April 12, as coronavirus restrictions eased, but with little fanfare.

Susanna Pressel, the local city and county councillor for Jericho and Osney, said the extension would help with congestion on the busy Botley Road.

The Labour councillor said: “It’s great to know that the Seacourt Park and Ride car park has successfully re-opened today, with an extra 595 spaces. This is good news for commuters, who will now be less likely to find that it is already full when they arrive.

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“It is also excellent news for residents in my ward who have had to put up with appalling congestion in Botley Road for many years. To have five or six hundred fewer cars at peak times will be brilliant.”

Works on the extension began in the summer of 2018, before suffering setbacks later that year.

In 2019, work on the extension began again, but winter flooding that year and in 2020, as well as supply delays due to Brexit, led to further delays.

Earlier this month, a city council spokesman said the Park and Ride bus shelter had been completed, and that lamp posts needed to finish the extension had been stuck in delivery limbo in the EU due to Brexit red tape.

The spokesman said: “In particular, Brexit regulations resulted in the late arrival of lighting columns.”

The Park and Ride extension has been criticised by the local Liberal Democrat opposition on the city council, and by the Oxford Flood Alliance, who did not want to see if built on flood plain land.

The project’s original budget in 2017 was £3.5m, and currently officially stands at £5.4m.