We travelled back to Abingdon today, after a two week holiday in Ireland (6 posts in the Not Abingdon Blog show some of our time there).
The journey from the ferry at Hollyhead went very well, but on reaching the M40 warnings appeared of delays on the A34 after the A4183. I wondered if we could avoid the trouble by turning off beforehand, It took me a while to realise the A4183 was the Abingdon turn off. A broken down vehicle was blocking the A34 afterwards.
On BBC Radio Oxford there were reports that part of the A34 northbound between Milton and Marcham interchanges had been closed for emergency carriageway repairs, and that was causing delays of over an hour with traffic queued back to Chilton. It also brought a lot of A34 traffic through Abingdon on the Drayton Road.
Some of the traffic tried to come via St Helens Wharf.
Anne says “Taylor Wimpey have restarted building in earnest after the failure of the final challenge. This time it was Goliath and not the David of local democracy that won, alas.”
Traffic out of South Abingdon was fairly slow this morning as most people headed towards Tesco, the trading estate, and the A34. It tailed back nearly as far as the new development.
The new pedestrian lights put in, at the expense of the developers, to marginally improve the traffic flow out of the Drayton Road by holding back traffic on Ock Street, have been operating for some weeks now. So it would be interesting to know if they have had the desired effect.
Two pedestrian crossings are replacing one crossing here in Abingdon. A developer came up with the scheme, and a planning inspector gave it the thumbs up, and so now it is nearly built.
The 2nd replacement pedestrian crossing, at the top of Ock Street, has caused a lot of traffic problems while being built. And has made it more difficult for pedestrians to cross the roads.
It also caused a lot of controversy before being built. It is being put in place to allow 158 dwellings to be built on Drayton Road, and should ensure traffic problems are no worse, after the additional housing, than they were before.
Local people wanted no more developments in South Abingdon without better infrastructure. Local people argued that the development was in the wrong place but that did not sway the planning inspector.