Towns that desperately need a bypass - your nominations

[zafferana]

Aylesbury

Bradford on Avon. Traffic wriggling through narrow roads in town centre. When they introduced a one-way system during lockdown (to allow for wider pavements) it was actually a lot better...

@OldTinHat

Worthing

Absolutely! But add Shoreham / Lancing / Arundel / Chichester to the list too. Probably Portslade etc too. The A27 doesn’t cope anywhere!

@YouCantTourniquetTheTaint

Reading!! The town centre is an absolute nightmare, we desperately need a bypass. I think the IDR is the worst bit of urban planning ever seen.

it has loads of park and rides. It would be fine if people used them instead of driving unnecessarily. I know some people are disabled, or are buying lots of stuff but I bet 50% of car journeys could disappear.

See also York.

@squashyhat

Worthing and Arundel? What is the A27 then?

A car park

@NightmareSlashDelightful

Edinburgh has one. It needs a better one.

Edinburgh is another place where there is really little need to use cars in the centre. It has very good public transport.

@EventuallyDelighted

Farnham needs to make it possible to turn right at the a31 junction by the station when you are coming from the Winchester direction, at the moment you have to go through town or Wrecclesham. Also Wrecclesham needs its own by-pass.

Newbury is another one whose problems haven't been solved by a by-pass, especially on race days.

Yes Farnham traffic needs a rethink. If you come from the Guildford direction you can't turn into town at the station traffic lights, which is also a bit annoying.

But there are other places where traffic flow would improve if there were bans on right hand turns and people had to go left around roundabouts or use different roads to turn right (not thinking of Farnham so much but the town where I live).

@HeddaGarbled

*1. Bad traffic

1. Build a bypass
2. Build retail parks on the town side of the bypass
3. People drive on the bypass to go to the retail parks
4. Build houses in spare land town-side, right up to the bypass.
5. All those new people drive
6. Build houses on the non-town side of the bypass
7. Bypass now gridlocked
8. Sat nav always tells you to drive through the town/city as quicker

10. Town traffic now worse than before the bypass*

11. Everyone shops at new out of town retail parks
12. Town centre shops close

This 1000 x this

The developers even pay and build the bypasses a lot of the time, like a bribe. Sometimes the only place for the bypass is across the greenbelt, which means they can use that nice empty unprotected field for houses instead.

Another vote for Ashbourne. We spend so much time queuing in traffic to get to the peaks in summer

@Abra1d1

There’s masses of housing going up in south Oxfordshire along with the rest of the county!

HS2 is doing a Stirling job of churning up that countryside as well.

The interesting thing with HS2 is the sites they have commandeered (sometimes not even paid for) is what will happen once the line has been finished. The sites aren’t being returned, they will still belong to HS2.

A few developers are going to make absolute killings on sites that would have been unobtainable for planning years ago.

Came on to say Aberdeen recently got a bypass but see I've been beaten to it.

Agree with Dundee though

Dundee.

Edinburgh is another place where there is really little need to use cars in the centre. It has very good public transport.

Which is fine if you're actually in the centre, or going into it. If you need to get around or past the city, the bypass is pretty poor.

@The4ks

Came on to say Aberdeen recently got a bypass but see I've been beaten to it.

Agree with Dundee though

I was in Aberdeen last week for the first time in about five years, and that new bypass is glorious.

Now, if they just sort out bloody Dundee, that drive will be extremely enjoyable.

Glossop!

Bakewell. So pretty, with the river and meadows, but as a pedestrian you can't relax; the 'pavements' are narrow, there are few marked crossing places and traffic just whizzes thorough constantly.

Up until a year or so ago I'd have said Lincoln but now the bypass is (finally) finished it's so much easier.

Agree with Boston. DH actually turned down a very good job because it would have involved dealing with the traffic every day and he couldn't face it.

Glossop is an obvious one, but its near-neighbour Mottram in Longdendale has much, much more traffic. It's hideous.

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Ilkley. Once (if?) it gets one, then all that would be needed would be to connect all the existing bypasses on the rest of the A65 together with decent roads and you'd have something approaching the trunk road it's supposed to be.

EvilPea
Oxfordshire seems to have been chosen as the county to which anything can be done. More houses than the population will ever need (despite us being told in our district that they were just building what they'd need for the local area--now changed, to, oh we need to provide houses for all the people we're attracting into the area because you're between London and Bristol, didn't we tell you that bit?). The 'Arc'. HS2. The threatened enormous reservoir south of Abingdon.

Pwllheli, one constant long line of traffic going through the centre in Summer.

If this was an X Factor type contest, Glossop/Mottram would definitely be getting its bypass!

It's actually OK in the town itself at the minute as the Snake is closed indefinitely but the people of Mottram, Tintwistle etc have it worse

Anywhere along the A27, which is getting to be as big a car park as the M25.

@Movinghouseatlast If they'd sort out the interchange at the crossroads on the a243 (Malden Rushett) then there'd be a viable alternative to going through Epsom but as it is it's 50/50 between sitting in traffic on either road...

Came on to nominate Ashbourne but see I've been beaten to it!

I would also nominate Nuneaton - it already has the A5 and A47 if you're going that way, but the A444 right through the town centre is such a pain. It would benefit from an alternative means of getting from the A5 to Coventry IMHO.

@HarrietSchulenberg

Telford. I mean, it's already got several bypasses, including the M54, but it needs a really good one so no-one has to fucking look at it at all.

Can confirm that this is true

A bit further up from Maidstone - Borough Green. The size of the lorries that come through our village because there is no slip road off the motorway to Sevenoaks is horrendous, especially when the A25 is shut and they all come down the A227. How the barriers are still standing in the village is amazing.