May I propose the following changes to Coasterjunkie's original route description with some local knowledge (being a road I travel along most days)? (My changes in italics)

Rob

A618: Rotherham - Clowne

This route used to begin right in Rotherham town centre, but has been truncated by half-a-mile and now starts at a crossroads with the A6021. We pass Rotherham General Hospital and cross the A631 at Whiston crossroads. Up a short, steep hill - complete with slow vehicle crawler lane - and then over the M1.

After a few miles of WS2 over rolling hills, we then drop down into Swallownest, where we meet the junction of the old A57 at a give way. We turn left onto what was the old A57 (where the two roads would have briefly multiplexed before the village was bypassed in the early 1980s) before turning off to the right at a mini-roundabout. We continue for another mile or so to the current junction with the A57 Aston bypass, which has rather an odd layout. The A618 kinks right off it's old alignment, meets the A57 at an at-grade give-way, multiplexes with it for about 50 yards and then diverges at a roundabout.

The junction with the A57 was originally a left-right staggered priority junctions, with D1 dualling on the A57 through and either side of the junction. However, the eastern junction with the A618(S) towards Clowne had a very bad accident record due to the high proportion of right-turn movements from both the A57 e/b to A618 s/b and from the A618 n/b to A57 e/b. In the late 1990s this junction was replaced with a roundabout. The western junction has been modified slightly so that all southbound traffic on the A618 must turn left; in order to go westbound on the A57 (very few movements anyway due to an alternative parallel route being available to the west) involves a u-turn around the roundabout.

The old northern stub of the A618's former alignment has now become an access road to a new housing development.

The road then travels past some nondescript factory units and Rother Valley Country Park before reaching Norwood on the outskirts of Killamarsh. A left turn at a mini roundabout and a sharp right-hand bend take us through the ex-mining village of High Moor to the access roads for the Woodall services on the M1, which is a secret junction as there are no barriers or other restrictions preventing you from using them. Also, the section immediately under the M1 has a suicide lane, albeit only for around 300 yards.

A winding, wooded section, followed by a narrower stretch with tight bends through farmland, bring us to the recently signallised at-grade crossroads with the A619. Another narrow section leads to Clowne, and a crossroad junction with the A616, complete with recently installed traffic lights. This is the current terminus of the A618.

However, the original route carried straight over the crossroads, through Clowne village centre and on through Scarcliffe and Stony Houghton, passing the A632 at a staggered junction and eventually ending at the A617 at Pleasley. This section has been renumbered as the B6417.

Andy [Coasterjunkie] with later revisions by Rob .

I didn't know the junction with the A618 had been a staggered crossroads. I have always wondered why the two routes didn't meet at a roundabout; it would have meant a simple realignment of the A618, half of which was done anyway.

Andy

No idea for sure, but my guess would be that it was due to the difference in levels since the old alignment was on a gradient where it meets the bypass, so would have had to be raised/lowered either side of the A57 to tie into a roundabout anyway.

The old staggered crossroads were very dangerous - the number of KSIs at the eastern junction was very high. However, as mentioned in another thread, I think there was a funding problem here - as the A57 was a trunk road as far as the roundabout to the west, from where Rotherham MBC (briefly) and Sheffield CC are the highway authorities into Sheffield city centre. Clearly the road has a local function at this point, so I suppose it would have been difficult to get an improvement scheme into the TPI.

BTW, hope you don't mind my changes - just a few additions!

No worries!

Andy

New, revised, text uploaded.

Thanks

Lez