'A36 Salisbury bypass could end intolerable gridlock'

The discussion prompted residents to get in touch.

Most of the correspondence the Journal has received so far has been in favour of a bypass for the city.

Here's one ring road resident's view:

'A36 traffic gridlock is intolerable and causes appalling pollution'

How wonderful it was to see in last week’s Journal that people are talking seriously about the need for a bypass for the city. 

The scale of the problems caused to the environment in the city centre by traffic pale in significance to those caused by the A36’s route along Southampton Road, along the Inner Ring Road and Wilton Road and the Downton and Blandford Roads also joining it. 

The result is frequent gridlock for the heavy traffic making life intolerable for both residents and those trying to pass through the city.

The pollution caused by these vehicles is appalling; both atmospheric and noise.

I live beside the ring road.

The scale of the pollution was demonstrated to me vividly a few years ago when I buried two 1,000 litre tanks in the ground of my garden to collect rainwater. 

Whilst these were filling up, and before the water had started to run off the top of the tanks into soakaways, I lifted the lids and looked in.

To my horror the surface of the water was covered in a layer of oil and soot. 

Furniture left out gets covered in a grey film.

Pollution on this scale cannot be acceptable.

Neither can the noise pollution which is continual except for a few hours in the small hours of the night. 

This was wonderfully demonstrated at the start of the first lockdown when there was a glorious silence and one could hear the birds singing instead of having to shout to be heard to be heard in a conversation in the garden.

The proposal to have a bypass at last for Salisbury gets my full backing and would be its saving.

An example of this is given by how the by-passing of the A3 round Petersfield instead of through it did wonders for that town.

From Nicholas Beard

Salisbury