A PLAN for a pedestrian footbridge which the council hopes will open up the Olympic park to the borough's residents will NOT be scuppered by the approval for a hydrogen refuelling depot for buses, it has emerged.

The fuel cell facility, to be built south of Ruckholt Road, off Temple Mill Lane, Leyton, will serve 10 environmentally-friendly hydrogen-fuelled buses. The plans were approved by the Olympic Planning Committee last week.

But as the facility will be surrounded by a 60m exclusion zone, the council feared it would be forced to think again about its plans to link Temple Mills to Eton Manor by a footbridge.

The council objected in vain to the application, saying “the most natural trajectory” for any bridge it would want to build would go through the 60m zone.

But despite the approval the Health & Safety Executive has now advised the council the bridge can still be built.

Council leader Chris Robbins has previously told the Guardian of the importance of opening access to the park so the borough's residents feel the park belongs to them after the Games.

The council's initial objection said: “The council is strongly opposed to a development that would inhibit its ability to realise the potential for physical connectivity between the area east of Eton Manor and the Olympic Park and Stratford City.”

But the Olympic Planning Committee report said: “While officers are generally supportive of measures to improve connectivity to the Olympic Park, it must be acknowledged that the bridge proposal is wholly aspirational at this stage, with no statutory land use planning weight.”

The report also said existing routes on to the Olympic site and to Stratford City, such as Ruckholt Road, and Leyton High Road, are “not prohibitive.”