It's 1971 and Stourbridge Town Council has come up with a great plan for crossing the ring road...

DUDLEY Council has admitted spending nearly half a million pounds on putting in Stourbridge's new ring road crossing - nearly FOUR DECADES after an almost identical one was ripped out.

The building and designing of the brand spanking new state-of-the-art' surface crossing and associated works has cost taxpayers £400,000.

But The News can reveal it was not such a brand spanking new idea after all.

Our front page picture reveals a strikingly similar triple crossing over the Hagley Road/Church Street section of St John's Road was in fact thought up and fully functioning 36 years ago...although many long-serving traders and councillors do not remember it.

Stourbridge MP Lynda Waltho was gobsmacked at the case of deja vu.

She said: "I'm speechless; it takes my breath away. It looks like it's in exactly the same place.

"It seems the more things change the more they stay the same. I would be interested to know why they took it up."

Chris Fonteyn, of Stourbridge Historical Society, is one of the few who remembers the crossing.

He said: "It was very close to where it is now. It's amazing how things go round in circles."

The new version of the crossing, completed last year, was originally costed at £130,000.

But with the cost of major structural improvements, landscaping, pedestrian ramp, lighting, facilities for CCTV and new traffic signs added on the total sum totalled £400,000 - £10,000 of which went to world class consultants Mott MacDonald to design the scheme.

A Dudley Council spokesperson. said: "The new crossing on the ring road has proved popular with residents - we continue to receive positive feedback."