Cornmarket Street, Oxford, looks more like a battlefield than a shopping centre.

Our picture on the front page today shows graphically the problems shoppers and traders are facing.

Given the troubled history of attempts to pave the street, it will surprise no-one that work has fallen slightly, though not critically, behind schedule.

Everyone will breathe a sigh of relief when the boards are taken down, the holes are filled in, the top surface is applied, the diggers are removed and even, perhaps, the odd tree is planted.

Most of us have forgotten what the street looks like without roadworks.

Yet when the project is finished, the test will be not how quickly it has been completed, but the quality of the work produced.

The last thing we want is another rushed and bodged job. We cannot afford any more mistakes in Cornmarket.