B9033

The B9033 follows the North Sea coast to the east of the Aberdeenshire port of Fraserburgh.

Route

The B9033 near St Combs

The route starts on the A90 (former A952) at Lumbs Crossroads and winds north, then northeastwards as it skirts the Crimonmogate estate, it then follows a series of long straights across the more-or-less flat coastal plain, passing a scattering of farms and houses as it slowly gets closer to the coast. The road undulates gently as it goes, and from time to time, mainly from the slight crests, the sea can be seen off to the right, but it then disappears again as the road dips and the fields rise and block the view. At length, the houses of St Combs come in to view ahead, but just before reaching this pretty coastal village with old stone houses, the route TOTSOs left.

Now heading north west, the road snakes across the fields at first before straightening up, with the ruins of Inverallochy Castle sitting in a field to the left. After passing through a staggered crossroads, the B9033 runs along the southern perimeter of an old wartime airfield to meet the B9107, which turns right to Inverallochy, another pretty coastal village which has a harbour a short distance away on the headland. From the crossroads, the route drops down to find a disused railway line, and the two run side by side through the dunes, although it is possible that the dunes have moved or that the road has been widened onto the old trackbed in places, as it is no longer obvious. As they converge, they cross the Water of Philorth. There are actually three bridges here: the original Bridge of Philorth, now closed to traffic, is just to the left whilst the remains of the railway bridge are to the right.

A golf course occupies much of the dunes, which rise and fall to block most of the sea from view, it is only glimpsed a couple of times. The B9033 then crosses the dismantled Fraserburgh to Aberdeen railway line, now a long distance path, and enters the town. A sharp left bend around the cemetery leads to a roundabout with the new B9034, which heads north to the harbour, while the B9033 briefly turns south, before curving round a retail park back to the east to meet a roundabout on the A90 (former A92). Until recently, this was the end of the B9033, but in 2017 it was extended around the town along Boothy Road. This is a distributor around the edge of Fraserburgh, forming a de facto bypass and signed as such. There are no direct frontages onto the road.

Lighthouse feature next to the A981 Roundabout.

It climbs steadily westwards up the slopes of Cairn Hill to the summit of 37m, incredibly the highest point of the whole route. Houses lie to the north, a few sitting almost entirely below the road as it climbs, while fields stretch away to the south. A new housing estate is then growing to the south just before the route reaches the A981, crossing it at a roundabout, beyond which it slowly starts to turn north. Housing estates continue on both sides of the road, although those to the left sit back behind some rough fields, perhaps intended to be developed as parkland. Two roundabouts provide access to these estates, the second added in the 2010s, before the final run north to the terminal roundabout on the A98 on the western edge of the town.

History

Outwith Fraserburgh, the route has hardly changed since 1922. A couple of bridges have been replaced, visibility improved at junctions, and a layby near the old airfield suggests a bend has been eased. However, within the town the original route has been changed, and then Boothby Road added to the route. From the roundabout with the new B9034, the B9033 previously continued due east to meet the A90. This route survives as a footpath between the supermarkets. The current line taken seems to be along a pre-existing road, which was presumably selected as the better route into the new retail park when it was being developed, and the old line subsequently closed up.

Boothby Road was built in the late 1980s or early 1990s, apparently as an entirely new build road to serve the growing housing estates on the southern and western fringes of the town. In 1993 and 1994 the Readers Digest Atlas shows Boothby Road as being an unnumbered primary route. To date, no other maps showing Boothby Road as a classified route have been identified, and it seems that this may have been a speculative depiction of the new road as a bypass to Fraserburgh. However, such a bypass is almost completely unnecessary for the town, located as it is in the north east corner of Aberdeenshire. The recent classification of the route as part of the B9033 appears to be more about serving the growing town as providing any sort of bypass route.

The 1922 MOT Road List defines this route as: Fraserburgh - Crimonmogate