RESIDENTS voiced concerns over disruption caused to a route into Stratford during the ongoing Birmingham Road work.
This came during during a meeting on Friday 20th June at the Ken Kennet Centre that was led by Warwickshire County Councillor cllr Lorraine Grocott (Lib Dem, Stratford North). The purpose of the meeting was to update residents on the ongoing A3400 Birmingham Road improvement works. cllr Grocott was joined by WCC officers from the A3400 project team who were able to answer questions about the latest phase of the scheme.
According to cllr Grocott, residents had lots of questions about how these works would impact their daily lives and how long the disruption to them would continue. There were particular concerns about the impact of the two town bound lanes on vehicles turning right out of Justin’s Avenue and Oakleigh Way, two junctions that lead to the Birmingham Road.
These issues were taken away by officers for consideration, and they pledged to return and address the questions and comments received from locals.
These traffic lights on the Birmingham Road in Stratford caused traffic delays over the weekend. Photo: Mark Williamson
The third of three planned phases of work to be carried out on the road by WCC got under way at the start of June. One of the main aspects of this latest phase will be to provide enhanced pedestrian and cycling provision as well as enhancing road capacity through the reallocation of road space from St Peter’s Way to Arden Street.
The works have been far from smooth, with the sometimes long delays for motorists along what is a main route in and out of Stratford.
Something that had strong support during a public consultation almost a decade ago was for a new slip road into Tesco – something that WCC scrapped earlier this year citing the cost and overall benefit to the area.
Cllr Grocott presented the details of Phase 3 which involves the stretch of the A3400 from St Peters Way to Arden Street. She explained that there will be widening and resurfacing of the footways to include pedestrian and cycle pathways. Inbound traffic will have two lanes from St Peters Way to Arden Street to improve traffic flow. The junction of Birmingham Road and Western Road will be remodelled with the traffic lights being removed with the idea being to alleviate the tailbacks to the Arden Street junction.
Speaking to the Herald, Cllr Grocott said: “I am pleased that I was able to facilitate this meeting with the project managers at WCC and our residents. I would like to thank everybody for taking the time to come along and speak to us. There was a free-flowing exchange of views, which the officers appreciated as it is so important to give people the chance to air their views and speak directly to WCC councillors and officers.
“This will be the first of a number of update meetings that we will be holding with the public on the Birmingham Road Improvement Works which have been ongoing since 2020. I believe that regular face to face meetings with the public going forward will do much to alleviate residents’ concerns going forward.”