23rd March 2009
Last week David Heath MP and I met with the Transport Minister, Lord Adonis, to discuss the maintenance plans for the key A303 Trunk Road.
A few months ago, the Highways Agency published plans for a complete closure for some 14 weeks of a stretch of the A303 from Willoughby Hedge to Mere. This would have involved a staggeringly large diversion off the A303 from Yeovil, up through Shepton Mallet and Frome, and back down to the A303 via Warminster!
There was understandable concern about the extent of the likely disruption, and David and I raised our concerns with Lord Adonis a couple of months ago when we were seeing him to talk about South West Trains’ misguided plans to cut staffing at their stations.
Lord Adonis wisely asked for the plans to be re-worked, and last week David Heath and I were briefed on the conclusions, along with a few other local MPs.
The new plan is somewhat better because although the work is still going to take place over many weeks, the period of complete road closure is being shrunk from 14 weeks to just 5 weeks. The work is now going to take place on site on a 24 hours per day basis to reduce delays, and a lot of the work will be done during periods of overnight closure and temporary overnight two way signals.
However, there is still an issue about the signposted diversion routes, with the long northern recommended detour via Frome still in place! This diversion is so extreme that it is unlikely that many drivers would follow it, which creates the risk of diverted traffic rat running through all sorts of unsuitable roads. The Highways Agency has therefore promised to go back and look at the plans again, to see whether an improved solution can be arrived at.
Lord Adonis has also indicated that in mid April he is going to tour the country to have a look at the state of the English Railway network. The Minister is likely to make a short stop in Yeovil on this tour, and he has offered to meet me and others interested in rail improvement for a brief discussion. I will now try to arrange this with interested groups.
Last week I was back from London on Thursday evening, after hours in Committee debating the current Education Bill.
On Friday I had a busy day, including a visit to South Petherton Infants School, my first tour of the Branstons’ business at Seavington, and an Advice Centre in Yeovil.
On Friday evening I attended a Public Meeting in Martock which was organised by John Bailey, who is the local Prospective County Councillor for the Martock/Norton sub Hamdon/Stoke sub Hamdon area.
John had managed to pull together an impressive panel to discuss the current “Credit Crunch” and what needs to be done to protect our local economy. The meeting was chaired by (Lord) Paddy Ashdown, and other panellists included Graham Watson MEP, the Leader of the Liberal Parties in the European Union, local MP David Heath, and County Councillor Sam Crabb.
There was a good turn out for the meeting, and a wide range of issues were covered including: support for farming; helping small businesses to bid for public sector contracts; and indeed the future dualling of the A303.
This brought both David Heath and me back to the meeting that we had had just two days before with Lord Adonis. Although this meeting was only to discuss the re-surfacing of the A303, we raised with Lord Adonis the Government’s plans to dual this key regional economic artery.
The Government had been committed to dualling the A303 all the way down to Ilminster, and then to dualling the A358 up to the M5. But the Government seemed to have got cold feet about this project last year, and when Ministers announced that the planned tunnel at Stonehenge was too expensive they seemed to take the opportunity to put the whole dualling scheme on the backburner.
Somerset continues to have an inadequate transport infrastructure, both in relation to rail and road links. David Heath and I will continue to campaign at Westminster to give both a higher priority.
Ever,
David.