North Lanarkshire consents 2.3km Towers Road Link for East Airdrie Link Road

North Lanarkshire Council has granted planning permission for the Towers Road Link, a 2.3km section of the East Airdrie Link Road in Airdrie, with construction scheduled to start in 2028 and the road due to open in 2030.

The council announced the consent on 16 October alongside confirmation from the Scottish Government of its funding contribution to the project, which will provide access to the planned new hospital at Wester Moffat. The release did not give a figure for the government's share.

The route will connect Towers Road with Forrest Street, where it becomes the A89 Airdrie Road, with a signalised roundabout at Varnsdorf Way. It includes a bridge over the North Calder Water and a roundabout giving a second access to the hospital site from the main East Airdrie Link Road, along with active travel features, street lighting and landscaping.

Council Leader Councillor Jim Logue said: "With planning permission in place, we can now move forward with delivery of the Towers Road Link, the first stage in this ambitious project." He said the original plans for the East Airdrie Link Road were amended to facilitate the hospital access.

The council and NHS Lanarkshire are delivering the project in partnership, according to the council.

The wider scheme

The East Airdrie Link Road is a 10km single carriageway running north from the M8 to the A73 north of Stand and Riggend. The council said it forms part of the Pan Lanarkshire Transport Corridor, a route linking the M74 in the south to the M80 in the north under the Glasgow City Region City Deal, and will link with the Ravenscraig access infrastructure south of the M8.

The council said the full scheme includes new bridges over or under the Airdrie to Bathgate railway, the North Calder Water and other streams, and local roads, with shared walking, cycling and wheeling paths through communities in the Airdrie area provided alongside the road.

The Glasgow City Region City Deal Cabinet approved the outline business case on 6 August 2024. At that point the council said the road was supported by £72.8m of funding from the UK and Scottish governments through the City Deal and from the council's capital programme. It said the estimated cost had risen from £85m in 2014/15 to £185m, with £50m reallocated from the Ravenscraig Access Infrastructure (RAI) North project to meet part of the increase.

Estimate date	Estimated cost of East Airdrie Link Road
2014/15	£85m
August 2024	£185m

Split planning strategy

In January 2026 the council and NHS Lanarkshire said they would submit a planning application in early 2026 for the hospital-to-A89 section including the Towers Road link, with a second application for the full road to follow in spring 2026. The council said splitting the applications would allow the road and hospital projects to progress in tandem.

A pre-application consultation on an updated alignment, including the Towers Road Link, ran from 25 September to 26 October 2025. The council's project overview page says the application for the full scheme was submitted to its planning service in June 2026 and remains separate from the Towers Road Link consent; no decision on it is noted. The 2028 start and 2030 opening dates apply to the Towers Road Link only.

Hospital reset

The Monklands Replacement Project entered a reset phase in June 2026. On 25 June the Scottish Government announced a comprehensive redesign of the programme, saying the £2.1bn cost of the current hospital design would not deliver value for money for the public purse and equated to an estimated £5m per bed. It reaffirmed its commitment to building the new Monklands Hospital on the Wester Moffat site, with core services including A&E retained and targeted investment in the existing hospital while the redesign takes place.

NHS Lanarkshire's reset Q&A, last updated on 2 October 2026, says the current full business case and design will not proceed, but that site preparation works at Wester Moffat will continue to completion, including access roads for construction teams. North Lanarkshire Council is listed among the bodies involved in coordination and governance of the redesign.

Health Secretary Angela Constance said: "A comprehensive redesign of the Monklands Replacement Programme is well underway, with refreshed plans to be presented to Ministers for decision in 2027, so that construction can begin as soon as possible."

Graeme Reid, project director for the Monklands Replacement Project, said the funding and planning decisions meant the community would benefit from a second hospital access route through the Towers Road Link. In 2024 the council had described the East Airdrie Link Road as the primary access to the planned hospital.

NHS Lanarkshire said it aims to bring forward refreshed hospital plans for a decision as early as possible in 2027. Work on the Towers Road Link is scheduled to start in 2028.