Roadworks delay is disappointing

7:00am Thursday 14th February 2013 in Letters

I AM very disappointed, but not altogether surprised, to hear that the Broken Cross Bridge reopening will now not be until March at the earliest, some four weeks after it was supposed to re-open.

Many readers will, like myself, have been greatly inconvenienced by this closure, travelling many extra miles to work every day, to say nothing of how local businesses will have been affected.

The small road through Ford, which is being used as a rat run, is falling apart under the volume of unexpected traffic and lots of rain.

I found it very strange that no work at all took place over the two-week Christmas break, and don’t know why nothing happens at a weekend.

There is obviously no sense of urgency on behalf of the contractors to complete this work.

Are they going to be penalised for not completing on time? Is pressure being brought to bear on them by our MP as he said he would?

M BOUCHER, Salisbury

Comments(7)

macogan says...
10:02pm Sun 17 Feb 13

1 The majority these workers spend a massive amount of time from there families so allowing them to go home for christmas is only fair. 2 due to it being a rail bridge they are limited to the amount of work they can do at weekends because of trains. 3 with britain having some of the worst weather on record it would have affected the bridge works. so you might have to leave littel earlier to get work it's only 4-5 months and you will have many many years of safer driving due to these works.

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opconker says...
12:32pm Tue 19 Feb 13

Like M Boucher, I along with many hundreds of others who live the "wrong side" of Broken bridge have endured the expense and disruption this work has taken. The bridge itself took a weekend to replace, yet we are told the council need some 3 months to lay a bit of tarmac and white lines down.
macogan must surely not live in the area and to say the works will improve safety is frankly wrong and misinformed. Nothing done here will make any difference to the safety, indeed it will certainly result in the large lorries that pass over it whilst using the road as a rat run to Southampton getting stuck and causing yet more chaos as they do every day.
The local businesses and pubs have suffered and will take years to recoup their losses, if they can.
Listen councillors, when the elections take place again , come over to the "wrong side" of the bridge and explain your inactions and poor planning!!

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reasonedhuman says...
2:03pm Tue 19 Feb 13

Its not just the people living on the wrong side of the bridge - people who live on the alternative routes have been affected too.

Those who live in Ford, Old Sarum and I am sure in other places have seen delays, congestion and a huge increase in traffic on the roads around them.

I have seen queues from well beyond the new housing estates in Old Sarum all they way to castle street round about - this isn't the case normally.

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macogan says...
4:36pm Tue 19 Feb 13

opconker wrote:
Like M Boucher, I along with many hundreds of others who live the "wrong side" of Broken bridge have endured the expense and disruption this work has taken. The bridge itself took a weekend to replace, yet we are told the council need some 3 months to lay a bit of tarmac and white lines down.
macogan must surely not live in the area and to say the works will improve safety is frankly wrong and misinformed. Nothing done here will make any difference to the safety, indeed it will certainly result in the large lorries that pass over it whilst using the road as a rat run to Southampton getting stuck and causing yet more chaos as they do every day.
The local businesses and pubs have suffered and will take years to recoup their losses, if they can.
Listen councillors, when the elections take place again , come over to the "wrong side" of the bridge and explain your inactions and poor planning!!
The bridge itself is in 8-13 sections and the main structure takes 2-3 days to put in place. to finnish the bridge off and waterproof it and finnish the brickwork takes 3-4 months, so this isn't a job that can be done on the weekend and the fact the bridge will be little wider will improve safety. having seen these workers complete 8 of the bridges and been on the majority of the sites speaking to them I think I understand what it takes to complete these bridges. Remember without lorries you get nothing they might cause a tiny amount of traffic problems due to there size and speed but they bring you everything you have ever owned or will buy today.

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IanMcL says...
6:37pm Tue 19 Feb 13

OPConker appears to be totally uninformed. Much has been corrected as the thread progresses.

This is a Government sponsored scheme via Network Rail. The NR contractors are Carillion.

The council had no say in when this happened, at all.

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opconker says...
8:27am Wed 20 Feb 13

Can't help feeling macogan and IanMcl are connected to this 4 month debacle.
It is not a case of being uniformed, it is a case of no information, lack of communicatioin and complete indifference to the local population.
So Carillon are carrying out the road works as well eh? When does that happen, they are never there more than 2 -3 a couple of times a week.

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gingin says...
3:16pm Wed 20 Feb 13

What a load of nonsense opconker spouts! There was plenty of information if you approached the right people.

Wiltshire Council and the two Wiltshire Councillors are doing everything in their power to help but the job had to be done- nothing WC or the two parish councils - Laverstock and Ford and Winterbourne - could have done to stop it.

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