IT has been 14 years in the planning and has cost Hampshire taxpayers nearly £10m.

Now a £270m supertram system linking Fareham, Gosport and Portsmouth has hit the buffers.

Transport Secretary Alistair Darling has shelved government plans to help fund the South Hampshire Rapid Transport (SHRT) link amid escalating costs.

But Hampshire transport chiefs have vowed to fight back - by somehow rescuing the plan and recouping the £9.5m of public money already spent.

County council leader Councillor Ken Thornber said: "This decision makes no sense at all. Only last week the Chancellor spoke about providing a considerable increase in the investment available to deliver improvements to the transport infrastructure.

"We remain fully committed to SHRT and we will explore every option.

"To do nothing is not an option and that would be a huge blow to so many.

"Those who travel in and out of Fareham and Gosport by road every day and all those dedicated staff who have put so much effort into this pioneering transport solution.

"The two transport specialist consortiums have also been so patient waiting for the government's decision - we just cannot sit back."

The cost of the tram plan, which aimed to remove more than three million cars a year from the congested M27 and A32, rose from £100m to £270m as insurance premiums spiralled in the wake of September 11, 2001.

A second phase would have connected the tram to Southampton.

Ministers are furious that light rail schemes are far more expensive in Britain than the rest of Europe.

Mr Darling ordered Hampshire County Council and Portsmouth City Council to go back to the drawing board and come up with a cheaper alternative and supporters of the long-awaited scheme were devastated by the news.

Fareham MP Mark Hoban said: "I am quite angry about this. It was described as a 'must-do' scheme, fundamental to meeting the transport needs of south Hampshire over the next 15 years.

"The decision not the proceed leaves us high and dry. There is no Plan B."

Gosport councillor Peter Edgar, who has been part of the light rapid transport panel since its inception, said: "It's a tragedy. This was a pioneering scheme and I expected it to spread right across Hampshire.

"It would have been a first-class transport system and, in my opinion, there is no alternative. We can look forward to more traffic jams."

The government decision to back out has also been met with widespread criticism by civic chiefs.

Fareham leader Councillor Sean Woodward fumed: "That's the end of the scheme then. I don't see any way the county and city council can go it alone.

"It's a very sad indictment on a government encouraging us to become a major urban development area in the next ten years but unwilling to fund the infrastructure needed to do it."

Portsmouth leader Councillor Gerald Vernon-Jackson said: "The transport problems that we were trying to address through this project do not disappear.

"The government's failure to back schemes such as this - guaranteed to ease congestion and provide vital new access for development along the route - does not help us to achieve such demanding targets."