Workers from Nottinghamshire County Council are moving to a new base at the Sherwood Energy Village, but the move has been criticised by a Conservative councillor at the authority.

Coun Mark Spencer, who is also a parliamentary candidate for Sherwood, told Chad: "I have immense sympathy for the people of Ollerton who have had to endure that roundabout for what seems like forever.

"I think the move to Ollerton is probably a positive thing but if the new roundabout was in place the impact wouldn't be so great. We are compounding a problem by bringing extra traffic to that roundabout."

And Mary Brown, from Ollerton Traffic Action Group, told Chad she welcomed the new jobs coming to the town but said the roundabout was inadequate.

"Unfortunately no thought was given to the already overloaded highway network," she said.

Increase

A spokesman for the county council admitted the new buildings would lead to a 'slight' increase in traffic levels, but said the authority will have completed its major improvement scheme at the roundabout by April 2011.

He said: "We have produced a travel plan for staff which sets out ways of encouraging them to car share to reduce their impact on local roads.

"Furthermore, we are enabling staff to work from home more often and use 'touch down' offices scattered around the county when out and about so they will not always be based at the site."

The spokesman added many staff currently travelled extensively to other offices in the county which would be reduced as they would be working from one site.

The criticism comes just weeks after a group of anonymous staff from the council also hit out at the plans, saying they were not environmentally-friendly.

The new offices will bring together staff from the north and east of Nottinghamshire in the highways, children and young people and adult social care and health teams.