More misery for motorists as Stratford grinds to a halt on Birmingham Road
STRATFORD was gripped by gridlock on Saturday as roadworks on Warwick Road and utility work on Birmingham collided in perfect timing to bring the town centre to a standstill.
Drivers had warned of this worst-case scenario happening and it did when endless queues crawled along Birmingham Road on Saturday morning and throughout the day.
The chaos was caused because temporary traffic lights and a cordoned off area of 16 cones near the Arden Street junction, which were put in place while urgent gas works took place, were not removed after the job was done and it wreaked havoc with many residents’ plans for the weekend which turned into write off.
Paul White from Stratford was one of those caught up in the melee.
He’d booked two trips to the council tip on Saturday morning but abandoned the second because the first took him over an hour to complete when he reckons it should only take 20 minutes.
“It was just mayhem - you just can’t drive around Stratford anymore. It took me one hour to go to the tip and back so I didn’t bother with my 10am booking. Why are they doing this on a Saturday with all the work on the Warwick Road going on as well? I got pretty angry and it’s the first time I felt compelled to complain to the council about this. I contacted county councillor Tim Sinclair and in fairness he kept me informed with what was going on but the whole thing was just mind boggling throughout,” Mr White told the Herald.
Not long ago transport chiefs pledged there would be more joined up thinking regarding the planning, management and – crucially - the timing of major roadworks in Stratford to try and ease significant disruption but in this instance Warwickshire County Council (WCC) was not responsible for the works on Saturday which were carried out by Cadent and included vital maintenance to repair sunken gas apparatus in the carriageway.
A WCC spokesperson said:“As part of an effort to improve road surfaces and to reduce the risk of damage to cars, Warwickshire County Council’s Highways Locality team had alerted Cadent to the damage their apparatus was causing to the surrounding tarmac.
“In order to avoid further deterioration to the road surface, the remedial work had to be carried out and could not wait until works on Warwick Road were complete in July. As a consequence, delays were inevitable. Works were scheduled for the weekend to avoid causing delays to commuter and school traffic encountered during weekdays.”
One month into the five-month major roadworks project on the Warwick Road there’s concern that Saturday’s traffic chaos won’t be an isolated incident and with several other traffic – albeit smaller – roadworks scheduled on roads in and around Stratford over the next few weeks, do the key players in highways at county council have a joined-up traffic management plan for their efficient coordination?
Warwickshire County Councillor Tim Sinclair (Con, Stratford North) said: ”Yes, they do, that’s a fundamental part of the role of the network management team. The majority of those smaller projects are not on main thoroughfares though.
The challenge is that sometimes there are works that the utilities companies need to complete to their infrastructure that have to be done quickly. They arrange their own traffic management and WCC is reliant on them removing that traffic management quickly after the works have been completed. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen on this occasion.
Whilst the works were completed on Saturday morning, unfortunately the traffic lights were left in place until 5.30pm on Sunday evening, causing unnecessary and prolonged delays.
What I’ve asked for is that the two project teams – Warwick Road and Birmingham Road – work closely with the network management team in an ongoing way so that any works done on or around the Birmingham Road, including emergency works, are monitored closely and additional steps put in place to ensure that the utility companies do what they are supposed to.”
In addition to Warwick Road and Birmingham Road projects here are some of the road works lined up elsewhere over the coming weeks.
Evesham Road, 22nd to 28th March, resurfacing, traffic light controlled.
Shipston Road, 23rd to 24th March, Severn Trent Water, traffic light controlled.
Tiddington Road, 8th to 10th April, National Grid.
Bordon Hill/Luddington Road, ongoing to 17th April, gas works.
Knights Lane closed, roadworks, start 15th April to 23rd August.
Evesham Road, 23rd to 25th April, utility repair, traffic light controlled.
