NEARLY 10 years after the saga began, work to resurface part of Oxford’s Cornmarket Street is set to start again.

For shoppers and traders, the sight of workmen re-laying the city centre road will bring back unhappy memories of the £5m fiasco.

Contractors are set to return to repair a section of the street near Carfax Tower that was dug up about two years ago – and left as plain black asphalt.

However, work has been delayed because the original buff-coloured bitumen – specially selected for Cornmarket – is no longer available.

Oxford City Council leader Bob Price said the authority had been calling on Oxfordshire County Council to finish the job.

He added: “Now it looks like they have not got the right asphalt that was designed for the heavy trucks going in there every morning. I find it quite extraordinary.”

“It is a real shame. We had something, after all the trials, tribulations and tears, that looked good, but then ends up looking shoddy and a bad job.

“This is quite a large area of asphalt.

“To ignore something as prominent as this is a travesty.”

Oxfordshire County Council spokesman Marcus Mabberley said: “The current asphalt surface at this location was installed by Southern Gas Networks and Thames Water, following essential utility work they carried out within the last two years. This was an interim measure as the material used to resurface Cornmarket Street some years previously was no longer available.

“It is the responsibility of Southern Gas Networks and Thames Water to reinstate a surface more in line with the surrounding surface and the county council is working with the companies to find a solution.”

The county said the utility companies would have to pay for the work, but the cost would only be known once a solution had been agreed.

Thames Water and Southern Gas Networks said they were working with the council and would carry out the resurfacing once a substitute material had been found.