ASSEMBLY transport minister Andrew Davies has this week rejected a report by independent consultants that Cardigan's Tesco junction should be re-opened.

He says the blackspot turning off the town's by-pass should remain closed, despite a recommendation from consultants working for his own department that it should be re-opened.

The long-awaited report on the junction, which was closed four years ago after a number of fatal accidents, looks at a number of options, including a roundabout, gyratory system and traffic lights.

But it recommends re-opening the turning, with only minor changes from its original format.

However, in a letter to Ceredigion's AM Elin Jones, minister Andrew Davies says he favours "making the existing temporary arrangements permanent". He adds this would be "a safe and economic option".

He dismisses the recommendation of the independent consultants' report by saying: "It does suggest that the upgrading of the fully open junction to current design standards would be appropriate, but a similar arrangement was previously trialled at this location but was found to be unsatisfactory due to driver behaviour." He does add that if there is future development of land to the north of the junction, it may be possible to "consider" the construction of a roundabout.

Elin Jones says she is "staggered" at the idea of making the current temporary arrangements permanent.

"The Assembly Government has commissioned consultants at a great cost to draw up options and it now seems that the transport minister is over-riding these consultants' recommendations. I hope that Ceredigion County Council will join me in strongly challenging the Minister's decision," she added.

Ceredigion's Cabinet is due to discuss the draft report next Tuesday before sending in its response to Andrew Davies. Last week director of highways Huw Morgan told members that the report is based on a number of "data errors", which "should be challenged".

Cabinet member Cllr Mair Morris said: "The report recommends reopening with only minor changes from the original layout. This is very disappointing, we could have written that ourselves. And the Minister's response is really very poor.

"The fight for a junction we can all use safely must go on. We want the junction safe and these solutions will not achieve that. If it had been done properly in the first place we would not be facing extra cost now."

The reports states that making the current temporary arrangement permanent would cost £110,000; reopening the junction with minor improvements would be £186,000; traffic lights, £405,000; a roundabout would be £1.25million; and a gyratory system, £1.734million.