ANYONE who followed the long fight over the proposed bypass in Aberdeen might have been forgiven for pinching themselves at the news the other day.

Eight months after the main legal challenge against the 28-mile road was rejected by the Supreme Court – ending a 10-year fight by indomitable local opponents – Transport Scotland was able to publish a shortlist of bidders for the contract.

Admittedly, the costs have soared from the original £120 mil-lion estimate when the project was first backed by the then Scottish Executive in 2003 to £900m now, but the majority of people seem to be turning a blind eye.

The overriding feeling seems to be relief that the road, widely regarded as a solution to Aberdeen's horrific traffic problems, is finally going to happen. Assuming things proceed with no further delays, it will start construction next autumn and finish in 2018.

The so-called Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route (AWPR), which will run from Stonehaven in the south all the way up to Tipperty in the north, is far from the only thing on the city's transport radar. It is the centrepiece in a variety of road developments that have all received planning permission and budget allocations, mostly after years in policymakers' in-trays.

Due next year is a link road between the A96 and Dyce to relieve pressure on Dyce Drive, currently the only route to the airport and to the business parks to the north-west of the city.

The year after, work is due to complete on a third bridge across the River Don. This will be followed in 2016/17 by an A96 park and ride facility, and some vital improvements at the Haudagain junction in 2018/19.

Derick Murray, director of regional transport partnership NESTRANS, says: "It's huge for us because we haven't done a huge amount of work on the ground in the last while.

"Within the next five to six years, we are going to see quite a significant change to transport in and around Aberdeen."

Mr Murray stresses the importance of forerunner projects such as the A96 airport link. "At peak hours in particular, you get very significant congestion. The new link will free up the traffic and let it move better. People in taxis will no longer be charged ridiculous amounts of money because they are stuck in congestion."

The new link road is music to the ears of the airport, which has done well on the back of the booming oil business in recent years. Last year's 3.3 million passengers was only a few tens of thousands shy of the record set in pre-crash 2007, boosted by the 124-metre runway extension that opened 18 months ago.

The airport is comfortably the third-busiest in Scotland behind Edinburgh and Glasgow, although specialists are nervous about the future as hub airports increasingly want to devote extra slots to more-profitable long haul.

NESTRANS has been lobbying the UK Government and the EU to protect Aberdeen's Heathrow slots, arguing that outlying airports also including Newquay, Belfast and Inverness ought to be given something since they will receive none of the benefits many cities will derive from high-speed rail. "I think we are being heard - but we haven't managed yet to turn that into a change of policy," says Mr Murray tentatively.

The airport is also hoping to benefit from a plan by Scottish Enterprise to make money available to airports such as Aberdeen and Dundee for routes to similar secondary sites in other European countries. This is being seen as a way around the fact that the state aid rules forced the Scottish authorities to scrap the route development fund available to all airports until 2007.

The city's rail system turns on two key arteries, one to Inverness and the other south to the central belt. A major piece of upgrading on the Inverness route, including knocking about 20 minutes off the inter-city journey to reduce it to two hours, is currently in the national infrastructure plan.

It will not complete until 2029, unfortunately, although some work will be done sooner, including putting in a station at Kintore between Aberdeen and Inverurie.

Planners are hoping that it will have the same galvanising effect to passenger numbers as previous new stations such as Portlethen and Lawrencekirk.

Mr Murray rejects any suggestion that heavy investments in the roads will undermine rail progress. Significant numbers of new houses are allocated to the north east in the government's structural plan because businesses are struggling to get people to come to work.

Quite deliberately, a significant number will be on the rail line in the Stonehaven and Inverurie corridors. The idea is that we can get people to use the railway lines as their means of transport in and out of the towns."

The other transport hub that will be looking for state assistance is Aberdeen Harbour. The oil business and various upgrades in recent years have ensured the harbour is filled to the rafters. It had a record year in 2012, attracting over five million tonnes of cargo and 28 million tonnes from shipping, but the place is so busy it is regularly making boats sit for hours offshore until a berth becomes available.

The answer looks like being building a second harbour at Nigg Bay to the south. This £300m-plus project found its way on to the Scottish Government's latest communication on its third national planning framework, but there is still a long way to go.

Colin Parker, chief executive of Aberdeen Harbour Board, says: "We have now engaged with Ernst & Young to help us with the business case and sources of external funding. We've started consultations with the community and various regulatory bodies such as Sepa and Marine Scotland. We're doing various other studies and are looking at a rough timescale of between five and 10 years."