Construction work to build the improved New Road junction in Gillingham will finish in the New Year.
Current work is focusing on flattening out The Old Manse site to bring the ground level up to the same height as the surrounding highway, as well as other work in this area such as ducting for the new signal cables and installing sockets for the new poles.
Work to date
Following the demolition of The Old Manse, which finished on 23 October, construction of the new junction has mainly been on the western side of Shaftesbury Road near Rose Court.
The initial four-way temporary lights put in place on 26 October caused significant delays for drivers and have been replaced with three-way signals. To help this new set-up, vehicles exiting Rose Court can now only turn left onto Shaftesbury Road.
This has worked much better, although there are still some delays at peak times. Our thanks to residents in Rose Court for their help with this.
Coming up
The three-way temporary lights will stay in place until the project is finished, with the works area moving around the junction.
Running up to the Christmas break, work will continue on the Manse corner to mark out and build the new kerb line and put in ducting tubes to take the cabling for the new junction. Work will then move to the east of Rose Court.
Construction work for the junction will finish in mid-January. It will be followed by cabling work by Siemens – with the new permanent signals turned on at the end of January. In February, SCOOT will be installed on the Le Neubourg Way corridor to link the traffic signals.
Before Christmas, additional drainage works will also be carried out in New Road, between Shaftesbury Road and Prospect Close. The existing temporary traffic signals will be extended west along New Road for this work to be carried out under these lights.
Further drainage and surfacing works will be carried out on New Road in March – from the west of Prospect Close up to the 30mph limit towards East Stour. Due to the location of the drainage, the road will need to be closed for around two weeks between Brickyard Lane and Prospect Close. More information will be available nearer the time.
Surfacing works
New Road will be resurfaced from just west of Prospect Close to the Shaftesbury Road junction during night work in January. The road will be closed overnight between Brickyards Lane and Shaftesbury Road from 7pm to 6am each weeknight from 11 January to 15 January.
B3081 Shaftesbury Road will also be resurfaced in January. The road will be closed between Newbury Roundabout and Orchard Park on weeknights, 7pm to 6am, from 11 January to 30 January.
One-way reminder
Our work to widen the pavements in Higher Station Road has finished. As part of this, the road is now one-way southbound (out of town) from High Street to Buckingham Road. The lower section of this part of Station Road remains two-way to maintain access to businesses at this end.
Some areas of new imprinted paving are awaiting a colour finish. This will be carried out in the New Year, weather dependent.
Thanks for this, that’s very helpful. We go to or through Gillingham two or three times a week and have been watching progress with interest (no option but to watch at times !). I think Station Road is much improved, it could be a bit of a dodgem track before.
Impressive work in Higher Station Road..well done. Looking forward to the complete works in 2021.
I disagree, Higher station road one way direction should be should away from the traffic lights, as people trying to get out from Asda have to wait a long time as there is very little room at the junction, when lots of traffic is coming from the town centre. If the traffic was to turn left from Asda up Higher station road traffic could move quicker away from the junction. Then make Newbury one way from Higher station road to the roundabout. This would also solve the congestion along Newbury that is always a problem
In view of the ongoing serious disruption to traffic, why is not work being carried out 24/7?
Hi Eoin, if the current work was carried out 24/7 it would be disruptive for nearby residents over a long period of time. Working 24/7 would not significantly reduce our works programme, as a lot of the work needs to be carried out during the day due to material deliveries, so there would be more disruption to people living near the works for very little gain.
Our Dorset Highways gangs are currently on winter hours, starting at 7.45am and finishing at 3.30pm. Many of them will also be part of our 24-hour on call rota to ensure roads can be gritted any time of day or night throughout the winter.
why not put A mini roundabout at this junction ?
Hi Vincent, There’s not enough space available at this junction for the size of roundabout that would be needed to take the volume of traffic it sees. Also, traffic signals provide safer conditions for pedestrians and cyclists.