Students from New-Bridge Integrated College in Loughbrickland, County Down, were welcomed to Parliament Buildings yesterday (June 18) by Northern Ireland Infrastructure Minister Liz Kimmins for an update on the A1 Junction Phase 2 project.

The Year 8 students have been involved in a youth advocacy project which encourages them to become social activists. They have been focusing on the A1 and campaigning for the commencement of the A1 Junction Phase 2 scheme.

Minister Liz Kimmins said: "Earlier this year I had the privilege to visit  New-Bridge Integrated College and hear from the year 8 students about their project on road safety on the A1.

"Since my visit to the school I am pleased to say that there has been significant progress  made on the tender process of the A1 Junctions Phase 2 and we are now planning to invite contractors to submit their detailed designs and costing for construction of the works in the coming weeks.

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"Given the large scale nature of the scheme this tender process is expected to take six months after which we will award the contract. In the meantime my Department intends to commence some preliminary site clearance work later this year in preparation for the scheme commencing in summer 2026."

The project will introduce a number of road safety measures along the carriageway and includes: Four new grade separated junctions; a new northbound on-slip at Castlewellan Road, Banbridge; a new link road to Milebush Road, Dromore, the closure of nine minor road junctions; a total of 21 existing minor road junctions to be modified to improved Left-In Left-Out junctions (LILOs); and the closure of all gaps in the central median (circa 100).

Additionally, the project involves the installation of a central median Vehicle Restraint System (VRS) concrete safety barrier, over a 25km stretch of the A1 between Hillsborough roundabout and Loughbrickland.

Other improvements also include the stopping up of over 40 private accesses onto the A1 plus the provision of Intelligent transport Systems (ITS) along the 25km route.