Most weeks I drive from Montgomeryshire, straight into the the Houses of Parliament. It usually takes an hour from Heathrow to the underground Car Park, where Guy Fawkes planned to start his little conflagration. The traffic can be dire. But nothing like as bad as it can be in Newtown in my constituency. The Newtown traffic problems are akin to those between Tokyo and its airport. So I asked for a meeting with Ieuan Wyn Jones, Deputy First Minister of the National Assembly for Wales, who also has responsibility for transport to discuss them.
Well, today the Deputy First Minister granted me an audience. It was a good meeting. I wish to share with you the position of the Assembly Government (at least the IWJ part of it) on the two issues of greatest importance. Firstly there is the mind blowing inefficiency of the current McDonald's traffic lights. I used to refer to them as the Tesco lights, but thought I should share the pain around. IWJ, supported by his transport advisory team, told me that immediate steps would be taken to improve the efficiency and if this failed, consideration would be given to re-instating the roundabout. The most incredible 'horlicks' was made when these lights were installed, but this is as good a response as I could hope for.
The second issue under discussion was the much talked about Newtown By-pass. All sorts of stories have been floating around. Well, it seems that 'stories' they are. The position is that unless (and this is a big 'unless) there are unforeseen delays in the relevant statutory processes, it's intended to start building the Newtown By-pass in 2013, and finish it in 2014. OK, so none of like delays of any sort, but I'll take 2014. Only three more years of travelling to Newtown via Bettws!
4 comments:
Thanks for this update Glyn. Work takes me all over Wales (I live near Aberystwyth) but dread any route that brings me through Newtown early morning or late afternoon. Roll on 2014!
so if they re-install the roundabout, are they going to take the traffic lights up at tesco junction too? what is going to happen to the traffic leaving tesco that want to turn right?
there will be a constant flow of trafic coming off the roundabout towards welshpool.
maybe a one way out of tesco to pop around the roundabout to leave town? Maybe worth considering??? or will this just create another bottleneck?
Hi Glyn,
A sweetener for what lies had perhaps? Wind farm construction traffic, national grid hub traffic, wind farm developer link pylons to national grid hub?
Your thoughts?
sadly, roundabout or no roundabout, Newtown will still have traffic problems.
bypass or no bypass will have the same effect. you only have to see how mad the traffic is in the town centre and see how quiet the roads are on the outskirts of the town.
Why does everyone always jump on the short sightedness band wagon?
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