Our surface dressing highway fixers are doing their best given the weather over the last two weeks.
Work completed week from Monday 10 to Monday 17 June:
- Little England to A35-Lane
- Jct Newport Lane & C60 Church Road
- Jct Bloxworth Road & Church Road
- C60 – Newport Lane to C60 / D50404 Bloxworth Jct, East Bloxworth
- Jct Church Road & Newport Lane Road end
- C60 – from C60 / D50404 Bloxworth Jct, East Bloxworth, to Jct A35, near Morden Mill
- The Lane – from outside Brook Farm to A31 opposite Botany Bay Inn, Winterborne Zelston
- Jct Cockett Hill / D1701 to B3075
- Bloxworth X-Jct with A35
Over the next two weeks, starting on Monday 24 June, we plan to treat the following roads:
- Langton Road – A354 Blandford Bypass to 150m past end of wall, Langton Long
- West End – A350 to North Farm, Spetisbury
- Arlecks Lane – Church Road to Down Road, Pimperne
- Down Road – Anvil Road to Arlecks Lane, Pimperne
- Newfield Road – from C47 to adoption end, Pimperne
- Bushes Road – from A350, Stourpaine to C13
- Bramblecombe Road – C34, Cross Lanes, to Newton Farm Access, near Bramblecombe
- Bramblecombe Road – Newton Farm Access south to C110, near Bramblecombe
- Pleck Lane – from Ansty Hollow to Rawlsbury Farm, Higher Ansty
- C49 – C139, No Man’s Land to C98 Cuckoo Lane, Bulbarrow Hill
- Dark Lane, Fifehead Neville
- Zoar Lane – from 376250-109264 To C98, Fifehead Neville
- Zoar Lane – from Stockfield Drove to 376250-109264, Fifehead Neville
- Stockfield Drove – Back Lane to C100, Hazelbury Bryan
- Garlands Lane – from Church Walk to C100, Okeford Fitzpaine
As we head into more rural areas, and work on lesser-known roads, please remember you can check where we are working by using the online roadworks map.
About the work
Our surface dressing gang is working 9am to 4pm in urban areas and 8am to 4pm in rural areas.
Surface dressing doesn’t take long and the road can be driven on as soon as it’s finished. Depending on the length of the road you live on, the road will be closed for around 1-2 hours while the treatment takes place.
There will be an advisory 20mph speed limit after the work while the loose stones ‘bed down’ into the bitumen. Travelling at this reduced speed will prevent skidding on the loose chippings, help ‘bed down’ the material and will save your paint work!
We sweep the road one to two days after the work to get rid of excess stones.
White lining reinstatement will follow on from this and is generally a week or so later.
Sorry for the inconvenience
We cannot work overnight as surface dressing relies on the evaporation of water from the bitumen binder (glue) for it to set, and it needs traffic to travel on the new surface for it to ‘bed down’ and lock onto the old surface.
We also cannot work in wet weather – any amount of rain or surface water dilutes the bitumen and so doesn’t hold the chippings in place – which is why our surface dressing programme runs from April through to September.
As this treatment is so weather dependent, dates are subject to change.
I have just travelled from Blandford to A35 Puddletown by pass through the road resurfacing. Delays for more than 30mins in that direction. Total journey took nearly an hour. Hardly any delays in the other direction. Why were there no warning signs about this work and delays at either end of the road so drivers could have avoided it. Many drivers travelling too fast thru chippings. How long is it going on for. Please answer by questions.
Hi Hilary, sorry to hear of the long delays. Advance warning signs should’ve been put out by our contractor on both side of the works area and all the details have been available online for a number of weeks: https://news.dorsetforyou.gov.uk/2019/05/23/ten-road-revamp/
The work should all be finished now.
Yes, some drivers do drive through the newly laid site too quickly and choose to ignore the 20mph advisory signs – unfortunately this is always a difficult driver behaviour for us to address.
On the way down to gosport on friday, hit a traffic jam of about 3 miles long, from morecomblake, until just before bridport, problem was a small road work gang, both sides of the road, 2 hours it took from moron Blake until 1 mile from bridport, is it going on for a period of time, as I’m going back to Torquay on Monday, thankyou.
Hi Paul, hopefully your drive yesterday was better. The work on Friday was emergency repairs to a collapsed manhole cover, which caused significant delays in the area (sorry you got caught up in this).
As a cyclist I am really disappointed to see that you are resurfacing roads with this cheap loose surfacing. It makes cycling even more dangerous as stones flick up from passing cars and the loose chippings take much, much longer to clear from the edges of the road that cyclists use.