It is now more than 13 months since the concept design for the Coffs Harbour bypass went on public display.

This Saturday will mark a year since submissions to that concept design closed.

In April this year on its website, the RTA said a report on the 232 submissions received in response to the display would be available in a few months.

That deadline has well and truly passed and this week an RTA spokesperson admitted it was overdue. He said the consultants were finalising their report on the submissions and expected to release it any day.

The RTA spokesman refused to speculate on what might be in the report, but what is known is that more than 75 per cent of submissions to the bypass concept design related to the need to retain the Luke Bowen Footbridge and to provide pedestrian access across the upgraded highway near the Korora Public School.

The RTA has signalled that it intends retaining pedestrian access across the new highway either by retaining the footbridge or building a new one.

The authority has said it will keep the name Luke Bowen Footbridge for the crossing to honour the year 6 student who tragically died in an accident in 1997.

The RTA reported in April other issues raised during the public consultation, which ended on October 31 last year, related to the design of the bypass and its potential impact on flora and fauna, flooding and water quality, noise and air pollution, agriculture, business, tourism and the Solitary Islands Marine National Park

Last weekend Federal Infrastructure and Transport Minister, Anthony Albanese, said all of the Pacific Highway between Sydney and Tweed Heads would be dual carriageway by 2016, but as yet there is no commitment of funding for a bypass of Coffs Harbour.

If the Government does succeed in transforming the Pacific Highway to dual carriageway in the next six years, Coffs Harbour will be the only regional centre between Sydney and the Queensland border bisected by it.