Work to rebuild the Old Cattle Market bus station is on schedule as part of the £21million Travel Ipswich programme – but passengers walking from there to the town centre will have to tread carefully.

Because while the bus station is being completely rebuilt, the pavement on the other side of Dogs Head Street and Falcon Street – in front of the Vodka Revolution Bar and along St Stephen’s Lane towards Arras Square – is not being repaired as part of the Travel Ipswich scheme.

The area was paved several years ago, but since then many of the bricks used have been cracked or broken by lorries using St Stephen’s Lane as an access to shops.

Some of the bricks have been removed and replaced by patches of asphalt, affecting the appearance of the area, while some are loose making it important for walkers to tread carefully.

The pavements were laid by the borough council, but responsibility for their maintenance was transfered to Suffolk County Council earlier this year.

A spokesman for the county said that repairing the existing paving was not included in the Travel Ipswich project. He said: “The pavements outside Vodka Revolution and on St Stephens Lane are not part of the current Travel Ipswich scheme.

“While our highways engineers check the area monthly, some parts of St Stephens Lane are privately owned and therefore we do not have authority over them.

“We will continue to monitor the situation and take action where needed.”

Work on the Civic Drive/Princes Street junction is reaching a crucial point with the new traffic lights turned on for the first time on Friday morning.

Meanwhile plans are well advanced to change another major junction as part of the Travel Ipswich programme.

The junction between Norwich Road, Valley Road, and Chevallier Street is to have its notorious mini-roundabouts replaced by traffic lights during the school summer holidays.

The work has been timed to coincide with what is generally a quiet time of the year on the roads, especially at rush hours, and should be complete by early September.

The introduction of traffic lights returns the junction to its former state before the mini-roundabouts were introduced in the 1970s.