Postponed work on busy Wigan roads will now begin this weekend

Motorists faced lengthy delays earlier this month when United Utilities carried out work on Whelley, with queues in both directions between Wigan town centre and Aspull.

Other news: Concerns over baby scans at private unit in WiganIt was part of a multi-million pound scheme to clean miles of pipes and improve the water supply in the borough.

More work was going to be carried out on Scholes and Riverway to install hydrants for the cleaning process, but it was cancelled at the last minute.

Wigan Council said it was due to the number of roadworks in the area recently, with United Utilities saying its contractor Morrisons had been asked to apply for a new permit with additional traffic management in place.

A new permit has now been secured and the work is due to resume on Sunday.

It will be located outside the Earl of Balcarres pub on Scholes, where a contraflow system will be in place.

The work was initially scheduled to last for three days, but will now be completed in just one day.

It will then move to Riverway on Monday, where one lane will be closed for three to five days.

The water firm is installing hydrants so that it can clean the water pipes to the homes to thousands of customers in a multi-million pound scheme.

Soft bullet-shaped polyurethane foam plugs - known as pigs - will be forced through pipelines to clean them.

The cleaning process is expected to be done at night with “minimal disruption” to traffic between 11pm and 6am.