One of Shropshire’s most popular tourist destinations, the Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site, will be hit by three months of roadworks to replace its ageing electricity supply.

Traffic lights will be in operation 24 hours a day along The Wharfage, the town’s main shopping street next to the River Severn.

But contractors promise they will do everything possible to minimise disruption and ensure the bulk of the work is completed before the start of the tourism season in April.

The £400,000 Central Networks project, which started today, involves replacing the 1960s power cables which travel underneath The Wharfage and cross the river below the arch of the Iron Bridge.

The aluminium-sheathed cables have an outer bitumen coating which is starting to decompose, causing low voltage and underground explosions which have lifted paving slabs.

Contractors Integrated Utility Services (IUS) will be digging up the carriageway between Buildwas Road and Tontine Hill, inserting plastic ducting underground and feeding the cable through.

The cable underneath the Iron Bridge will be removed as part of a longer-term project to stabilise the structure.

Ray MacDonald, IUS project manager, said: “We are doing the work in a 12-week window at this time of year to minimise disruption.

“We have a lot to do and have agreed with Telford & Wrekin Council to work through until just before Easter.”

Adrian Cousins, who owns the shop Homeward Bound in Ironbridge, said: “The Wharfage will remain open during the work and it will be business as usual.”