In the great sweep of human history, there have been some remarkable journeys: Shackleton in Antarctica, Hannibal with his elephants, Armstrong stepping off that ladder.
Now, I can add another one. On Thursday afternoon, I drove from junction 9 of the M25 to junction 11 — a distance of almost five miles — at an average speed of 68mph.
Even more astonishingly, I drove back again at the same pace. Then, I drove from the A3 north to the M25 west without having to sit for half an hour in a traffic jam on a slip road. Same in reverse. Same top to bottom as well. Whichever way I went through it, there were no delays at junction 10. It worked like a normal junction.
For more than three years, the M25-A3 interchange at Wisley has been a giant and mind-numbing set of roadworks. The speed limit has been 50mph, but the actual speed has been a lot less.
Traffic being diverted during closures on the M25 in 2024
YUI MOK/PA
In the last few weeks, the main routes in this £317 million upgrade have been fully opened. The elongated roundabout, the brisk “fly lanes” and the wider slips are all up and running, though there are still some trees to plant and fences to erect, and the A3 is shut once again this weekend. But the Great Surrey Gridlock is almost in the rear-view mirror.
At the Anchor pub, about a mile from the interchange, the mood is celebratory, at least for the two retired couples I speak to. Every four to six weeks, Sue and John drive down from St Albans, Hertfordshire, to meet their old friends Mike and Pat, who come up from Fareham, Hampshire. RHS Wisley is the mutually agreed halfway point which, for the last three years, has been unfortunate.
“It’s been terrible,” says Sue, glass half empty. “We’ve sat in queues and queues and then people jump in front of you. It’s been going on for far too long.”
“But it’s brilliant now,” says John, glass half full. “We all arrived on time today.”
Mike’s mood darkens as he describes trying to get from the A3 northbound carriage to the Wisley turn off — “it could take half an hour just to get up to the roundabout and back again” — but then he brightens because the trauma is over. “It was much better today.”
Elwyn Owen, of RHS Garden Wisley, is not as forgiving. “To date we estimate our losses over the entire roadworks period to be just under £14 million as a result of fewer visitors, loss of memberships and a reduction in sales in our plant centre, cafes and restaurants,” he says.
Owen is thrilled that the roadworks will be finished next month — they’ve planted more than 100,000 tulip bulbs in preparation for what they hope will be a busy spring — but he describes the last three years as “extremely challenging”. “Frequent road closures and missed or extended deadlines have resulted in severe delays for visitors and our local community,” he adds.
Since the upgrade began in 2022, Wisley has had 350,000 fewer visitors per year; 80 per cent of members who visited less frequently gave the roadworks as their reason. With the help of Alan Titchmarsh and, presumably, his pitchfork, the charity is now asking for compensation to cover the “devastating” and “catastrophic” losses. Almost 100,000 people have signed a petition on Change.org for the government to step in.
It is very quiet in the voluminous gift shop and garden centre at Wisley, but it’s January and it’s raining. Of the retirees and young parents eating cake and perusing the hellebores, there is unanimous delight that the roadworks are coming to an end.
“It was a death trap,” says Alice, who has brought her toddler for the afternoon. “I’ve been up and down the A3 all my life and I’m a reasonable driver, but it was just dangerous, with the idiots cutting in and the absolutely silly junction.”
The upgrade promises a much more relaxing journey due to the overhaul of the junction
JOSHUA BRATT FOR THE SUNDAY TIMES
Before the upgrade began, this was the most dangerous junction on the UK motorway network. Over a five-year period, there was one collision on average every week. Plans to improve the junction were first mooted more than a decade ago but the sheer enormity of the task becomes apparent when you wade through the 292-page Environmental Study published in 2016.
In whittling down 24 different upgrade strategies to three and then to one, Highways England had to navigate Byzantine planning regulations from the local to the European level. They had to think about noise, driver stress, a Roman road, the way in which every local resident’s view could be impacted and, of course, badgers. That there are wetlands, woodlands, bat habitats and areas of scientific and archaeological interest in the area didn’t make the report any shorter.
It would also have been fun to be in the meeting when they realised that they’d have to shut the M25 down completely for the first time in its history in order to install the two largest of eight new bridges in the project. (In the end, the “car-mageddon” predicted to accompany the weekend closures did not materialise — enough of us, very sensibly, avoided Surrey.)
Having read the report and its many appendices, it feels a little churlish to point out that the project is running nine months behind schedule (a result, National Highways claims, of extreme weather events in early 2025). How over-budget it will be is yet to be calculated but Jonathan Wade, the senior project manager, is clearly happy that it’s almost over.
• ‘Extreme weather’ delays work on M25’s worst junction by a year
“We have made huge progress at junction 10 and we’re delighted to have now restored both the M25 and A3 to 70mph,” he says. “This important project will reduce congestion, improve safety and boost economic growth.”
Cockrow green bridge, the first bridge in the UK to connect two heathlands, is not open to wildlife or humans until next month, but there are four other bridges for “non-motorised users”. After a half-hour walk through some beautiful woodland from a scout hut, I make it onto one of the new bridleway crossings and watch a good chunk of the 5,000 vehicles using the junction per minute flow past.
Back in the car, I make it through junction 10 painlessly once again. I’m feeling as delighted as Hannibal must have done on his way down the Pyrenees until I see a sign at junction 7. “Vehicle stranded,” it says. “Delays of 60 minutes are expected.”